Just Another Day at Gotham High
by Supernova95
Summary: AU. What could go wrong at the Robins' school? You know what... don't answer that. Rated T just in case UPDATE: When Bruce Wayne is kidnapped can the Robins save him in time?
1. 11: The First Day of Term

**Hi, I was sorting out files on my computer and I stumbled upon this FanFic I started just after christmas. At first I was tentative to put it up because I read a similar one on this thread but my friend convinced me to put it up and say "I did not steal any ideas from any other writers" so there I have said it :)**

**I hope you like it... Enjoy :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Batman or anything Batman related **

* * *

They woke up to screaming. It was Damian… again. Bruce had left him at home the previous night and he wasn't happy about it. By the time Tim had gotten dressed and went downstairs to have breakfast it had been going on for at least ten minutes.

"For the final time Damian, you are only six years old. An assassin trained six-year-old; yes, but not a Gotham trained one. You are only allowed out on quiet patrols until you get used to the city and, more importantly, the people in it."

"But Drake got to go" Damian knew Tim was eating his breakfast just behind him, he thought Tim was beneath him… he thought everyone (except his father) was beneath him, but Tim seemed to bear the brunt of that more than most.

"Tim got to go because he is older than you and has grown up in Gotham his entire life. Now will you please go upstairs and put on your school uniform" a sentence that would have usually ended a conversation sent a new argument up into the air.

"No"

"And why not?"

"Because school is a stupid waste of time, that we could spend fighting crime"

"He's a poet and he just didn't know it" Jason said as he walked into the room and sat down to start his breakfast. This received a raised eyebrow from Alfred who gave him a bowl of cereal and two slices of white toast, butter and jam for breakfast. It also received a 'shut up' glare from Bruce that made Jason turn away from him, but not in an apologetic way, Jason was trying to stop himself from laughing.

"School is not stupid, Master Damian, it is an integral part of growing up and learning" Alfred's English accent cut through the silence.

"It is stupid and I'm not going"

"Yes you are Damian" Bruce caught the eye of Dick who had also just arrived for breakfast before school.

"Don't look at me like that, I told you last night you're on your own." The three elder boys smiled. Damian was a giant pain who only seemed to respect his father, so when he didn't it was amusing to watch.

"Damian, I will not ask you again, go upstairs and put on your school uniform, or I will be forced to put it on you myself" Damian looked up into his father's eyes before conceding and going upstairs, he hated it when his father dressed him, it usually ended in tickles, and he hated tickles.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later and they were all in the car ready to go. As Alfred pulled away Damian took a last longing glance back at the house.

"First day nerves little bro?" Dick asked seeing this. Damian looked at him with a pale white face, his usual stuck up stubbornness melting away and he nodded

"What if they don't like me?" Dick smiled his famous smile and pulled him into a brotherly embrace.

"Of course they'll like you, but if anyone gives you grief you come straight to me or Jason. You may be a trained assassin, but Jase and I; we're trained bully fighters, it's a another skill altogether" The youngest boy smiled, so did his father who had never, is his three months living at Wayne Manor, seen his son smile unless he was running around the city skyline in a cape. It was actually a nice sight.

"Are you all sure you have everything you need?"

"Yes dad" they replied in unison, in varying tones. Jason sounded as though he was bored out of his mind, then again he usually did. Tim replied as though he was standing to attention, eager to please. Damian was barely audible; The league of Assassins had put him through a living hell for the first five years of his life but that sounded like heaven compared to school. Dick just rolled his eyes as her replied to the all too familiar question.

"We're all fine, if we need anything, which we won't, we won't hesitate to call you or Alfred." Dick finished for his brothers; they went through the same routine at the start of every school term. It was tradition.

The car pulled to a stop, Jason put away his games console, Tim stowed his book in his bag and Dick released his brother so they could all get out of the car.

"Alfred will be here to pick you up later, Jason please try not to get detention on your first day back, look after Damian and we will see you tonight." Bruce liked being a worried parent, it was refreshing. "Have a good day at school" the boys waved their goodbyes and stuck around just long enough to hear Alfred's reassuring Queen's English accent tell Bruce that they would be fine and to see the car pull away before they turned and walked into the school gates.

The school was one giant building that catered for students from preschool all the way up to high school seniors. Truth be told it was pretty intimidating. Only the best of the best go to Gotham high, or the rich of the rich. It was a place where either the smartest, but poorest, kids were bullied or the richest kids were bullied, no matter how smart they were. The bullying wasn't usually nasty, but for Bruce Wayne's kids the smears were endless. Tim, especially, got no respect at school; it was widely known that he was attending Gotham High on the best scholarship the school offered before being adopted by Bruce Wayne. The boys usually stuck together, with a small tight group of friends, people who didn't care who they were or how much money their father had. People like Barbara Gordon, who was running up to them to say hi after the summer break. Barbara was the daughter of the Police Commissioner and was attending Gotham High on a Gymnastics Scholarship… no one bullied Barbara.

"Hey guys, how was your summer?" she asked as she approached the group

"Boring, yours?" Dick replied

"Okay, dad forced us on a two week holiday to some out-of-the-way part of Oklahoma. He gets two weeks holiday and we spend it in the most boring, there-is-nothing-to-do-there part of the country." She growled then sighed "But apart from that I had a good summer"

"Good" he was smiling at her and she was smiling at him. Jason rolled his eyes

"Will you two get a room"

"What?" they asked together and immediately burst into simultaneous giggles. All Jason could do was roll his eyes at them again and pull Dick off towards their part of the school. Fear started to prickle in Damian's eyes

"Don't leave me"

"Don't worry little bro, we just have to go to lessons in this part" he pointed to the middle section of the building "of the school"

"'Cause we're Middle Schoolers" Jason interrupted and Dick swatted his brother in the arm.

"You and Tim are in that part" he pointed to the far left

"'Cause you're in the Elementary school and- Ow!" Dick swatted his brother in the arm again but this time harder… much harder

"Damian, school is nothing to worry about. You won't do much today anyway. All that's going to happen is you'll get to know your class. It's not that bad. Jase and I have to go now, but we'll see you at break." He turned to Tim "Normal table, school canteen… and Tim; look after your brother" Tim nodded his reply and with that the two older boys left to start their days.

"So…" Tim started awkwardly "we go this way…" he started walking and Damian followed in an awkward silence. Tim still hadn't forgotten about what Damian had said that morning, and neither had Damian by the sound of it.

They entered the school by the door furthest on the left and walked into brightly coloured halls with children's work lining the walls. Tim looked down at the letter they had been sent when Damian was accepted into Gotham High. 'Room 2b: Mrs Himnest' Room 2b was the second room (first door on the right) after one flight of stairs. It was a normal room, full of desks half filled with children who either were smiling so much they could have been poisoned by Joker gas, or they looked as though they could burst out crying at any minute. Tim remembered his first day of school, he was neither smiling nor upset, he just sat there with a blank expression. His father had been paralysed shortly before the start of term in a freak accident. He had no tears left and wasn't in the mood to be happy, he had wanted to be in the hospital with him but his dad insisted he went to school.

"This is it Damian, basically your second home for the next few months. You'll be fine, I'm just down the hall in room 2g and I'll be back here at break to pick you up and take you to the others." Usually first grade classes stayed together and were taken, by their teachers, to a little playground out the back of the school they shared with the second graders, but as Damian had elder siblings in the school they were allowed to look after him at break and lunch times. Damian gave his brother a quick squeeze before entering the classroom. The teacher looked up expectant to see a parent showing their kid to class, her face fell a bit when she saw Tim but she forced a smile and greeted him. He nodded a "Hi miss" and waved Damian goodbye before exiting and walking to his classroom, which he was given at the end of the previous year, along with his new teacher; Mr Gobnen, whom he hated.

"This is going to be a long year" he thought to himself as he walked into room 2g.

* * *

The first two periods of the day went without incident. They were given their timetables and a little time to socialise with their classmates whom they hadn't seen for three months. Then they were set some light exercises as a quick reminder of what they had learnt in the previous year, which Tim found amazingly easy, then the bell went. Even though it had passed quicker then he thought it would he hurried out of his classroom and down the hall to Damian's where his brother was waiting with a teaching assistant. He reached out his hand and Damian took it without looking back.

"Having fun?" Tim asked as they descended the stairs and went out the door they came in. unfortunately the Elementary school had not yet been given a connecting door to the rest of the campus, they kept promising, it never came. Damian pondered the question a moment then nodded a little. Tim smiled, "That's good". He showed his brother into the school's main entrance and they were greeted with a long white corridor lined with lockers, classrooms and some sets of stairs. Damian's jaw dropped and quivered slightly. Everything was bigger here, wider halls, bigger staircases, bigger kids. Unfortunately, as a first grader and a fourth grader they weren't very high on the 'who got hall walking priority' list. After being pushed about and bumped into all the way down the hall they finally made it to the large and old wooden canteen doors. Using all his strength Tim managed to push the doors open, he usually would have used a different entrance to the hall but this way was the most direct and he thought that Damian should get the best first experience of the hall. If it was even possible Damian's jaw dropped further and his eyes widened the hall was a spectacular sight. It was one of the few remaining parts of the original school build when Gotham was first established in the 1800s. It was made of Portland stone, and had a cathedral nave type feel to it. There were arches going down the hall that always made Tim feel like he was at Hogwarts, that and the oak tables the school board had purchased to 'keep the old feel' to the room. The only thing out of place was the canteen hatch in the wall on the opposite side of the room. It was state of the art but ugly looking and didn't fit with the room's ambience; unfortunately it was a government requirement ambience or no ambience.

Tim continued walking, with Damian hot on his heels until they reached their usual table in the corner of the room. Dick, Jason, Barbara and another boy eating a newly bought sandwich, were already at the table.

"Damian, this is Tony, he's in the grade below me. Tony this is Damian, our baby brother. He just started first grade" Damian shot Dick a glare at being called a baby and sat down at the table. The other boy, Tony, finished his mouthful and stuck out his hand

"Pleased to meet you Damian, your brothers have told me all about you" he laughed at the panicked expression that flashed across Damian's face "don't worry they only told me the good stuff" Damian smiled, but couldn't quite find any words to reply with so he just took the outstretched palm.

"It totally wasn't my fault" Damian suddenly focused on the conversation his brothers were having

"And how wasn't it your fault Jase?"

"The guy insulted me"

"So you swore at him… repeatedly, even after being told to shut up by Mr Clark"

"Yes" he looked down at the table not able to hold eye contact with Dick "He had it coming" his voice was angry and he humphed crossing his arms at the same time, slouching in his chair and putting on an angry straight faced expression.

"It's not an afterschool is it? Because if it is then dad is not going to be happy"

"No it's only a lunchtime…"

"Good" that finished the conversation and Dick went back to whatever he was doing before, a worksheet or something. Jason looked a bit put out by Dick's short end to the conversation then his face brightened into a mischievous smile

"Must be a new school record though, right?"

"No" this time it was Tim who piped up "You set that at the beginning of last year when you tripped up that teacher on the way to your first lesson" his eyes did not look up from the book he was reading.

"Oh yeah" Jason's mood visibly brightened at the table, seemingly happy that he held the record for the quickest detention. "So Tony how was your summer?"

"'Twas okay, but ungh, my mum agh…"

"Tony what's wrong?" Barbara asked as Tony squeezed his eyes shut gritted his teeth and rubbed his forehead with his palms.

"Heads on… agh… fire, hurts like… agh" he was sweating and looked as though he could collapse at any time.

"We need to get him to the nurse" Dick said taking control of the situation "Barbara, could you run ahead and tell the nurse what's going on" she nodded and ran off, Dick then turned to his brothers "we need to get him upstairs. They all set to work; despite their training with Batman it still took all three of the eldest Robins to lift Tony onto Dick's back who then proceeded to start half carrying, half dragging Tony up to the nurse's office

"Tony what have you eaten?"

"Ungh, always with the jokes Dick?"

"Just trying to keep you smiling… what can I say I'm a perform…er" Tony started to cough seemingly uncontrollably just as Dick was finishing his sentence. His coughing became so violent Dick that had to drop him, and he was no longer responsive.

"What do we do?" Tim asked the question and the boys all shared glances,

"We get him to the nurse" Dick replied and they each grabbed a limb, Dick and Jason grabbed Tony under the armpits and Tim and Damian grabbed his feet so that if one of them had to drop him Dick and Jason could still drag him. That was until he started convulsing.

"So what do we do now, Dicky boy" for Jason exasperated teasing was a coping mechanism, although not a very nice one. Tony suddenly started thrashing around kicking his legs and arms in various directions and Dick was out of ideas. Then it all stopped and Tony became dead still.

"Is, is he?" Damian started looking out from behind Dick where he had taken refuge from stray limbs.

"No, he's still breathing" Tin responded; watching the slow rise and fall of Tony's chest.

"Then why isn't he… agh!" Just as Damian spoke Tony's eyes shot open. His pupils were dilated so much they took up the whole of his iris and his corneas were drastically bloodshot. He looked angy.

"Tony? Are you okay?" Dick started as Tony got up. He was no longer convulsing or coughing but he was still sweating.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Not that you'd care…"

"What? Of course I care, if I didn't why would I drag you up all those stairs?"

"Because you feel sorry for me, the helpless nerdy boy here on a scholarship, whilst you Mister I-was-adopted-by-Bruce-Wayne get to go here all expenses paid by your rich daddy, in fact the new sports complex even has his name on it" he had started to back Dick towards the wall, although he was a year younger than Dick he towered over him and found it very easy to oppress the elder teen. "You don't care about anyone, why should you? You have all the money you could ever want why should you be bothered with a little boy like me?"

"Because you're my friend…" Tony punched him, he wasn't expecting it and he stumbled back into a row of lockers and fell onto the floor. His nose was bleeding but nothing felt broken and he looked back up at his attacker;

"Friend? Ha, I'm just an acquaintance, someone to keep you company through school then you get to go off and run a company presented to you on a silver platter by your rich daddy, whilst I'll have to work for the rest of my life… I bet you've never had a hard day in your life." there was a collective intake of breath from the small crowd that had gathered around the commotion, sure many people pestered the boys about their rich father, but they all knew what the kids had gone through before their adoptions and none of them stooped so low as to remind them of it. Dick's eyes stung with tears and Jason moved to clock Tony back when Tony collapsed. The crowd started to dissipate when they saw the one way fight had broken up; a kid collapsed on the floor just didn't hold as much appeal as a fight. Jason started to help Dick up as Tim checked Tony's pulse, he was still alive.

"Dick are you okay he clocked you go…" he was silenced by Dick's 'shut-up' stare; mouth open Jason stated "Yours is better than Bruce's" that at least brought a smile back to the first boy wonder's lips. He had seen this sort of behaviour before but he couldn't remember where, his mind and head were buzzing too much.

Overaggressive, out of character behaviour, thoughts he know weren't in his mind before. It dawned on him.

"We need to get him to the nurse's office and then we need to ring Bruce, I think we've found some of the missing drugs" the three elder boys faced lit up in recognition and enlightenment. Damian's just looked more confused

"What missing drug?"

* * *

**Please review and tell me what you think. :)**


	2. 12: Drug Deals

**Hi again, shorter more backgroundy chapter today... **

**Enjoy :)**

**Disclaimer... I do not own Batman or any Batman related characters :)**

* * *

"What missing drug?" he was shushed by his brothers who putting fingers over their mouths told him to only speak about Batman stuff in a whisper at school, you don't know who's listening.

"Our mission last night was to take down a new drug dealer, dealing a very dangerous behaviour modifier." Dick started to tell his brother as they made their way to the nurse's office.

* * *

_The previous night…_

_Warehouses, why was it always warehouses? They were on the trail of a drug dealer who had recently ventured into Gotham to sell his stuff; big mistake. This was Gotham. The Batman's city. Their city. Whoever thought that they were just going to sit around all day whilst someone was dealing on their streets was an idiot. And that is why they were at this warehouse; waiting for a dealer who was supposed to show up half an hour ago. Dick sighed. He had never been a very patient child. Not like Tim who could wait for anything, but not in the way that Jason just rushed headlong into anything without thinking it through. He just… liked punctuality. That; and the seat he had found himself was very uncomfortable. He really needed to get up and stretch. _

"_Nightwing, there's movement in your area, three o'clock; ten seconds" he looked around, getting up slightly into a crouching position, keeping himself low he peered over the edge of the warehouse. Sure enough a few seconds later a man wearing a long brown trench coat with the collar upturned; sunglasses, even though it was the middle of the night, and carrying a heavy looking silver metal brief case walked purposefully round the corner. _

"_Finally" he muttered under his breath and then he opened the comm channel to his family "I see him Batman: white male, brown trench coat, sunglasses and brief case. He just went into the side door of warehouse 27. What do you want us to do?" a few seconds passed until he got a response_

"_Everyone meet on the roof". Sure enough they did just that, and twenty seconds later they were looking through a small skylight at what was going on in the building. _

_It was a deal, that much was obvious, and what looked like one dealer, one recipient and three bodyguards. They were taking about something, probably the deal. Even though they couldn't hear what was being said they didn't need do; drug deals were all the same… the dealer comes in with a briefcase and the buyer asks if he brought it, even though it is obviously in his hand. The dealer then asks if the other person had brought the money. That gets shown too. Then they exchange briefcases and go on their way, the muscle is just for show; so one of the parties doesn't do something stupid. Here it seemed that the dealer had asked to see the money first as they saw that briefcase close just before the dealer's opened to show a purple drug. This was new. They had to move before the exchange or they dealer and his buyer would probably run off whilst they were dealing with the goons leaving a new drug on the streets and the mission a failure. They all looked at Batman and he gave the signal. They worked as a well-oiled team. Nightwing, Batman and Red Hood dropped down through the skylight, taking out one goon each with the force of their fall. Then Red Hood and Nightwing went after the buyer whilst Batman took on the dealer. Theirs wasn't a very long fight, the buyer wasn't very good, in fact he looked as though he was a Gotham businessman, and as much as they may talk the talk, they certainly don't punch a very good punch. He looked down for the count after one punch from Jason, even for him that was something of a record, Dick sighed; he didn't get to show off, and that was his favourite part. He was a performer after all. Nightwing turned his attention to Batman, even after four and a half years watching him work was still awe inspiring. The dealer was an experienced fighter, but still no match for the Batman who took him down with such fluid ease. After securing the unconscious dealer's hands behind his back he looked up _

"_Nightwing, Red Hood…" he motioned up with his head, the two boys turned to see the buyer, who they thought had been knocked out, running for the open door. Dick smiled, he saw the bo staff across the door, the buyer did not. He went flying and landed facing away from them on the small of his back, they heard a loud grunt and then a smack as he fell backwards into the dirt. He had instinctively closed his eyes when he tripped and now opened them to find Red Robin standing over him with the point of the bo staff in his face._

"_Don't even think about it" the buyer physically relaxed as he conceded defeat. Nightwing smiled again Tim was only nine but he knew exactly what to say and when to say it. He even got a "Well done Red Robin" from Batman, at which he smiled infectiously and the two other boys also broke out into grins and ruffled Tim's hair a bit. Batman then looked down at the businessman_

"_Don't you ever even think about buying illegal drugs in my city again or I won't be so lenient" He walked over to the briefcase full of the new purple drug and picked it up; he then went back into the warehouse. Tim had got the hint and removed the zip tie Jason had used to tie the man up in the first place. The buyer scrambled to his feet and started to cautiously edge away from them, once he was sure that they were not going to go after him he broke into a sprint until at least after he was out of their sight, probably further. _

_Batman re-emerged with the dealer and the two briefcases. He roughly shoved the dealer into the trunk of the Batmobile and motioned for the boys to get in; they knew what came next… the interrogation._

* * *

_It had started to rain. They were atop Wayne Tower waiting for the dealer to come to; which shouldn't have been long due to the amount of blood that was now rushing to his brain. He was hung upside down by a Batrope from one of the many gargoyles on the side of the building. The rain started to pick up and Batman shooed the three boys under the cover that the building naturally gave, he defiantly didn't want three ill boys around the house, especially as they started school the next day. It then started tipping it down, the gargoyle, living up to its name, started to pour the collected water from the roof of Wayne tower onto the unsuspecting drug dealer woke up with a very un-manly scream. The boys, well Jason mostly, laughed. Ignoring his children Batman proceeded to grab the dealer by the shirt, pull him out of the water and upright._

"_What's the drug" the dealer smiled, that almost never happened, people were just too scared of Batman. Undeterred he pushed the dealer under the water again it immediately went down his nose and he opened his mouth to breath; only for that to be filled with water too. Batman pulled him out of the cascade again. The dealer snorted and spluttered, trying to rid himself of the water. His eyes now filled with panic. He didn't want to be forced under the water again. Batman didn't repeat his question, he just glared his famous Batman glare and the dealer talked._

"_It's a behaviour modifier and hallucinogen, it makes you more aggressive, and it plants thoughts in your head that weren't there and makes you act on them as though you had had them for years, like a grudge just coming to the boil. But that's not what it's marketed as. It's on the street as the new almost legal high. I was told to get it to as many people as possible… that was the easiest way to do it."_

"_Who told you?" his voice suddenly got far angrier._

"_I…I can't they'll kill me, I won't stand a chance" the dealer was begging, just to make sure he didn't want to change his mind Batman pushed him under the water again, this time his scream was unbearable and Tim hesitantly tugged on the back of Batman's cape. The Bat looked down at his son, adopted or not, and pulled the dealer in._

"_How much have you sold?" _

_Coughing up water and snorting it out of his nose the dealer replied; "Five kilograms each to seven different buyers, five of them are dealers too, it has probably reached a few dozen people by now and the dealing night hasn't even begun to pick up". Batman cursed. They were in for a long night. _

* * *

_Four hours and numerous drug induced call outs later, they had finally taken down all the middle man dealers, and who they had dealt to. That still left ten kilograms of the drug out there but with the dealer refusing to give up the names of his buyers or the name of his supplier and the rest of the drug recollected or accounted for; the Bats decided to call it a night. Although it was a relatively short journey back to the manor by the time they had arrived Tim was already fast asleep and Jason looked as though he could nod off anytime. _

"_You know Damian's going to be annoyed that we didn't bring him along" Dick said as they drove into the cave._

"_I know he's a trained assassin but he's still six, and no matter how much training he has had I am not bringing a six year old to a drug bust." Bruce replied strongly. He had only let his youngest don the Robin uniform on routine patrols on quiet nights. Damian kept saying it was because his father didn't trust him, what with his upbringing, but everyone else knew it was because Bruce didn't want him getting hurt. Training could only do so much and the mean streets of Gotham were completely different to an egotistical maniac's Tibetan base of operations. Dick shrugged_

"_If he has a temper tantrum on you don't look to me for help" the Batman's usually stern expression lifted to a small smile as he stopped the car and got out. He told the two oldest boys to go to bed, they looked beat and it was the first day of school tomorrow. They groaned a bit but did as he said. When Jason waved to the sleeping Tim, Bruce told them he would sort him out. He got changed in the cave as quietly as he could then scooped up the sleeping boy and carried him up to his room. He stirred just as they reached his room and although awake he let Bruce get him into his pyjamas and then gave him a hug before Bruce tucked him in for the night. The Batman then went back to tracking down the lost ten kilograms of drugs in the quiet of his cave._

* * *

"_**The test has gone perfectly Master, the children are vulnerable, what is our next move?"**_

"_**Our next move is already in motion. You have the package?"**_

"_**Yes Master."**_

"_**Deliver it"**_

"_**Yes Master"**_

* * *

**So... review and tell me what you think :)**


	3. 13: Evil Sandwiches

**Chapter 3 is up :) **

**Thank-you to everyone who reviewed, completely made my week... Ask Celticliliy, she was there when I was literally bouncing down Winchester high street :)**

**YAY, It's the penultimate chapter in this arc, but do not fear I am not stopping this story, I'm having too much fun writing it to do that :)**

**Disclaimer: Really you think I own Batman? Okay so I'll own batman when Lex Luthor becomes President of the United States... that's already happened? well I'll own Batman when Superboy Prime punches a hole in reality, therefore creating some time anomalies and Jason Todd comes back from the dead... That too huh? **

**I'M SORRY OKAY... I DON'T OWN BATMAN... you happy now? **(I got bored of normal ones ;D )

* * *

They were in the Principal's office quietly waiting for Bruce to arrive. Apparently if there was an assault of any kind it was school procedure to contact the parents; made sense really. It took about 20 minutes to get from Wayne Enterprises to Gotham High; Alfred got Bruce there in fifteen.

"Woah! I hope Alfie didn't break any speed limits getting you here" Jason said teasingly as Alfred opened the door and he and Bruce stepped into the office.

"Of course not Master Jason, we just managed to catch every green light on the way here" Alfred replied in a matter-of-fact manner, but made sure that the boys caught his wink once the Principal's back was turned. That was why they all loved Alfred, well the older boys at least, Damian had yet to warm to the fact that Alfred was more than just a butler; he was, for all intents and purposes, their grandfather, and most of the time they treated him as such, which they knew warmed his heart. A bout of giggling broke out, before Bruce silenced them with a kind, but stern, glare. He rolled his eyes at Alfred; who then proceeded to give them a 'who me?' look, which made even Bruce smile.

The Principal turned back around from looking out of his window, and, in a truly businessman like manner, requested that they sit down, so they sat. There were only three chairs in the Principal's office apart from the Principal's own, so, Damian sat on Dick's lap, who still had tissue plugged up his nose to stop it from bleeding, and Alfred stood by the door in true stereotypical butler fashion; playing his part in the family's façade was his favourite thing to do when out of the house.

After about twenty minutes of the Principal's ramblings of how sorry he was; what they were going to do with Tony; trying to persuade Bruce not to sue; Bruce lifted up his hand. The Principal was silent immediately; the power he had over people as Bruce Wayne still surprised Bruce and he let out a gracious smile.

"Please Principal Ashtkins, we are not going to sue anyone." the Principal was visibly relieved, "but I will ask to talk to Tony's parents to see if I can get a blood sample to take back to the labs at Wayne Enterprises. I know Tony, he has been a friend of my sons' since they began at this school and he has visited our house on many occasions. This is not like him at all and I just want to make sure he isn't sick with anything that might have impaired his judgement." slightly bemused by the request the Principal looked at them blankly for a moment then agreed and led the group up to the nurse's office where Tony's parents were sitting next to their still unconscious son.

* * *

Being an extremely expensive private school the nurse's office looked more like a mini hospital than a school nurse's room, it was immaculately clean and equipped for anything. 'Nurse' Anderson herself was a highly trained doctor who could deal with just about any problem the kids could come up with. Tony's case however had left even her bemused. She had given up on trying to wake the boy up and was now sitting behind her desk filling out the necessary forms for him to be transferred to a hospital in-between researching what could have caused his current predicament.

"Why hasn't he woken up yet? He should be awake." Dick was first to speak, his voice was high pitched and nasal. Jason snorted at the sound he made, no one else laughed; it was a valid point.

When he spoke Tony's parents turned round and stood up;

"Mr Wayne I'm really sorry it's not like Tony to-" she was cut off by Bruce

"Relax Mrs Green, my one and only concern in this matter is Tony. How is doing?" he directed the last part to the school nurse. She looked up from her desk took of her rather large reading glasses and took a sheet of paper, from beside her computer screen, over to them, giving it to Bruce who started to study it.

"It's weird. He's not comatose, just asleep. Deeply asleep. We have tried everything to wake him up but, so far, to no avail."

"How is he not in a coma if you can't wake him up?" Tim asked, being somewhat of a know-it-all he was genuinely interested

"Well apart from the fact that he hasn't yet been unconscious for the designated six hours before we declare him comatose, he responds to light and sound stimuli, he tosses and turns sometimes, and he was snoring a few minutes ago." Tim's face scrunched up in concentration as he processed the bizarre information just given to him.

"So what's keeping him asleep?"

"That's just it; we don't know. By all accounts he should be awake and okay to be in class at the moment, albeit with a few weeks' worth of detentions, he just isn't. I have called for an ambulance to take him to Gotham General so they can run some tests and keep him under observation, but apart from that there's nothing I can do." She returned to her desk and continued to fill out forms.

"Mr and Mrs Green" Bruce began "I was wondering if you would let me take a sample of your son's blood back to Wayne Enterprises. The samples from Gotham General get sent to us anyway and I can put it in as a priority one vile so that we will get the results back in a couple of hours, not days"

"Of-of course, anything to help our little Tony, Doctor Anderson already took a sample for the Hospital which I guess you can have" The doctor nodded and went to the fridge, removed the only blood sample in there and gave it to Bruce, who took it and gave it to Alfred whilst he put his briefcase on the table and opened it. To most of the room's amazement inside wasn't a load of files but a special designed cooling system for samples of presumably all kinds. Seeing the open mouths Bruce explained the origin of his briefcase whilst he put the vile into one of the compartments.

"It's a R&D project for crime labs, obviously some evidence must be stored at low temperatures, like blood, and some smaller labs don't have the facilities to transport samples to bigger labs so they can do tests the smaller labs can't without paying out huge amounts of money, and having to wait days to get enough samples to make the transport financially viable. So we came up with the- well a forensic investigator at the Central City Crime Lab, by the name of Barry Allen," the boys, and Alfred, all smiled at the reference to their family friend "came up with the idea of a briefcase that solves the problem, we just tinkered with the idea and made the product. They're cheap, easily stored and powered and we are about ready to put them into production, all that was needed was a test run. Then Dick called and told me what had happened, when he told me of Tony's symptoms I immediately thought he would need a blood test, so arranged to test the brief case… and that explanation took far longer than I had hoped, I must be going. I want to get this" he held up the briefcase, indicating the blood sample "to our labs as soon as possible, Alfred." he nodded to the door

"Of course sir" came the reply

"Alfred and I will be around after school to pick the four of you up, Jason; please don't get into any more trouble."

"How did he know" Jason mouthed at Dick, who smiled and mouthed a

"He's Batman and you're… you" back. Bruce seeing none of this nodded to the Principal and the Greens

"Thank-you Mr Wayne" Mrs Green said looking at Bruce directly in the eye, the sincerity in her voice made Bruce smile;

"As I said before no harm done; I hope Tony gets well soon" he stood up straightened out his suit and walked to the door where Alfred was waiting expectantly, handle in hand, when Damian suddenly rushed over and gave his dad a small hug goodbye, which was reciprocated, then Damian retreated back to standing just in front of Dick with the elder boy's arms comforting him around his neck.

Once the formalities of goodbyes had subsided Alfred opened the door, to a little more resistance then he expected. As it turned out on the other side of the door, trying to open it at the same time and therefore stumbling into the room and falling into Bruce; was a fifth grader, who looked as though she had just seen a ghost.

"Doctor Anderson, Doctor Anderson" the kid said not paying any attention to the man she had just run into "please you've got to help, my friend, Jimmy, he just got really angry in the middle of French and then collapsed, Miss Colrain sent me to get you, we don't know what's wrong, please he needs your help." She then saw Principal Ashtkins standing in the room looking at her in a very disbelieving way "Principal Ashtkins… I'm sorry for barging in like that, I'm just scared for my friend, I didn't mean to-"

"Ella, breath. Calm down, you are not doing your friend any favours by panicking," he looked to Dick, "Dick could you explain what happened to Tony to Ella." Dick nodded and took the tissues out of his nose so he at least sounded a little less bunged up;

"Well, at first he complained about his head throbbing and feeling like it was on fire; and he collapsed for the first time. Then he started coughing and convulsing. Then he woke up with hugely dilated pupils and completely bloodshot eyes and acted all aggressive towards me, then he punched me and collapsed again, and now he's asleep and we can't wake him up."

"That's exactly what happened to Jimmy" Ella piped up without even having to be asked. The adults in the room shared a look and three more kids came running in complaining about just the same thing.

"Mr Wayne, how many blood samples can that briefcase of yours take?" Doctor Anderson asked after collecting a blood sample from the eleventh pupil with the same symptoms.

"Eighteen at a push… well at least it will have been well test driven…" smiles came to their faces for a brief moment before yet another pupil asked for Doctor Anderson's help.

"I don't think this is some mysterious new illness" The Doctor said as they rounded another corner "I mean it makes no sense, there is no pattern to who has come down 'ill', most have never met each other, although some are best friends, and many are from different grades and classes, there has to be something more to it."

"Wait, What? You think someone is poisoning the kids? Why?" Bruce tried to put on the best surprised voice he could

"I don't know, a lot of these kids have wealthy parents, such as yourself… what's the old saying; "Follow the money". I just know this isn't like any virus studied in known history"

* * *

"So what do we know?" Dick asked as he paced around the empty classroom they had found themselves.

"Well as of now twelve children have come down with the same symptoms as Tony" Tim received a few how-the-heck-did-you-know-that looks from his brothers, he blushed and looked down to his feet shuffling them a bit "… Dad just texted me"

"Fair enough, Timmy can you set up a database, to log everyone who has come under the influence of the drugs" Tim nodded "Do it" he moved to the computer at the side of the and turned it on. "What we need to figure out is how they all ingested the drug" there was silence as the boys pondered what could have happened,

"Could it have been something they touched?" Jason suggested

"From what dad told us after analysing the drug last night, it has to be ingested to work" Dick replied still thinking

"But we also know that the drug's been modified to put kids to sleep afterwards, could it have been changed to get into someone by skin contact?" Jason added with bright eyes as he had actually thought of a good idea, that was usually everyone else's forte but not his. Moments like this made him smile.

"Possible but then wouldn't more kids have had drug induced episodes throughout the day? I mean how is it that these children have been influenced and not others? like why has no one in first or second grade come been affected? I'm still guessing it's something they have eaten or drank" when Dick's reply came Jason's face fell a bit, it made sense though.

"Well Tony was eating that sandwich and I saw the fourth grader, Jimmy, eating a similar one" Damian spoke up, and silenced the other three boys. They all looked at Damian; then broke into smiles.

"Damian, I think you've got it"

"Would explain why only some kids have been affected…"

"First and second graders are separated, not allowed in the big part of the school"

"And that would obviously explain how it got into their systems"

"But how did it get into the sandwiches?"

"Kitchen staff?"

The three older boys kept bouncing around ideas at such a speed that Damian found it hard to keep up, he caught a few suggestions here and there, mostly Jason's outrageously stupid ones.

"Oh, Oh the dinner lady did it, it's always the evil dinner lady… can we go punch her now?" Damian and Tim rolled their eyes; Dick just looked at his brother

"No"

"But-"

"No, I very much doubt, however evil you think she is, that the dinner lady, or anyone on school staff did this. I also doubt that it was a giant mutant marshmallow, or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles trying to rid the world of Shredder but accidently poisoning some defenceless school kids in the process, geeze Jason, you need to stop watching Saturday morning cartoons…" Jason smiled sheepishly

"So what's your great idea Dicky Boy?"

"Will you please stop calling me that and I was thinking that we should check whether the school has employed any new kitchen staff this year, as they could be possible suspects and we should check the visitors logs, to look for any suspicious visitors"

"Already way ahead of you bro" Tim said from the corner of the room "New kitchen staff was easy, I'm just waiting on the visitors logs, the server's being a little slow."

"One day you are going to have to teach me how to do that" Jason commented as he ran over to the computer with Dick and Damian

"No you'd just spend all your time hacking into your grades and changing them"

"YOU CAN DO THAT?" Tim facepalmed his brother's comment, wishing he had never mentioned it.

"No that is highly illegal"

"And this isn't?"

"This is only kinda illegal"

"Oooooooh, and **I'm** the rebel of the family" The boys rolled their eyes at their brother

"Yes." Tim said in a monotone voice that started a new bout of giggles from Dick and Damian, Damian especially.

"Okay" Dick interjected bringing them all back to the matter at hand "Can we get a print out of this?" Tim flicked his eyes towards the printer, he had already printed out the job list "How did I not hear that?"

"You were too busy talking about giant mutant marshmallows and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"

"And the visitors' log?"

"Should be out in a couple of minutes, as I said, the server is being slow."

"Cool, then we go steal a sandwich and find Dad"

* * *

The Principal breathed a sigh of relief. The last ambulance had just left and they had had no more reports of infected children. The total count was twenty two, out of a school of over a thousand he guessed it could have been worse, a lot worse. He rounded the corner to his office but when he heard laughter he paused and looked in the glass window. Wayne's kids were still in there, three of them were at least. Dick, the eldest, was still off being questioned by the police who were looking into what was going on. It looked to him that Jason and Tim were keeping Damian occupied with piggyback rides, and a game of catch that looked somewhat to be a danger to his office. It was amazing just how much like a family they had become, each from drastically different backgrounds, with some sort of tragedy that forced them together, it was quite sweet really. He opened the door and they immediately stopped what they were doing and almost stood to attention.

"At ease boys" he said jokingly "Shouldn't you be in lessons"

"No sir, the police told us to wait here" Tim said

"Why?" the Principal enquired

"How should we know" Jason blurted out, annoyed at something. Tim un-surreptitiously stomped on his brother's foot to get him to either shut up, or show more respect, both of which were futile aspirations.

"I think they just want to clarify the facts, sir" Tim answered for all of them.

"Okay, it's almost lunchtime, once the police have 'clarified their facts' you four can go straight to lunch" the three burst into smiles, Jason even whispered a small but excited "Yes", which received a raised eyebrow from the Principal

"I'm supposed to have chemistry now, things… don't go right for me in chemistry" It was true, the boy couldn't make more things go wrong for him in that subject even if he tried. The principal smiled and Dick came back through the door with two police officers. They went back over the facts of the day which must have been recounted at least ten times already, then said they would look into the kids' theory and left the room. The boys also turned to leave the room when the Principal stopped them

"What theory?"

"Well it was Damian's theory, really…" Dick said nudging Damian forward, who then proceeded to blush and run around to the other side of Dick. The Principal laughed, and Dick explained it to him. "Damian remembered that Tony was eating a sandwich he brought from the canteen, and said he saw Jimmy, the fourth grader who was affected second, also eat one. We then talked to the friends of the affected and all of them said their friends had eaten a sandwich"

"So, what are you saying" the Principal enquired, he knew where they were going with this he just wanted verbal confirmation

"We think someone's tampered with the sandwiches, sir" Tim said and the three other boys nodded "We managed to give one to our dad before he left, so the labs at Wayne Enterprises can test it, but we suggest that you stop selling them in the canteen sir" the principal nodded and went over to his telephone, after punching in the number for the kitchens he looked over to the boys,

"You can go" they smiled at him and left the room.

* * *

"Who knew an afternoon could be so… boring" Tim said as he and Damian found their brothers waiting at the school gate.

"Speak for yourself; Jason somehow managed to set fire to his book in English Lit"

"Check me, I don't have a lighter or matches on me, I seriously don't know how it happened"

"At least you didn't set off the fire alarm; I don't think the principal could've handled that too" they boys laughed a bit at Dick's comment. This was defiantly the worst part of the day; being picked up. Well being picked up and being dropped off. People always gave them dirty looks for being dropped off at school and picked up in a limo. It wasn't anyone's fault really; they had plenty of cars… but none of them had enough seats for all of them to get to school, and for Bruce to get to work. Dick sighed; he hoped Tony and the other kids affected were okay.

"Where are Father and Pennyworth, school finished ten minutes ago and I want to go home" Damian wined, he seemed to turn into an arrogant rich kid when he was tired and his brothers rolled their eyes.

"They'll be here in a minute, it's rush hour, they're probably just stuck in traffic…" just as Dick replied Alfred pulled into the car park "speak of the devil… see Damian, we'll be home soon" Damian smiled and climbed into the door Alfred opened for them. Inside the car Bruce was sitting looking at some papers, when they got in he looked up.

"When we get home, suit up, I know who drugged Tony and the other kids"

* * *

**I'm, thinking of doing a chapter on Jason's mishaps in Chemistry and was wondering if anyone had any ideas of what could happen, baring in mind this is Jason ;)**

**Also, the next chapter will be the last in this arc (as I said at the beginning), so if anyone has any suggestions of what to do next I'm all ears :)**

**Thanks for reading; please review :)**


	4. 14: Why did you have to eat the cookie?

**I'm sorry about the action (or lack thereof) in this chapter, I came to write it and just drew a blank on that part, but I promise to write an awesome fight scene next time they have a confrontation :)**

**Next chapter is on Jason in chemistry so if anyone has a mishap they want me to include speak now or forever hold your peace (unless of course I decide to do another one)**

**Disclaimer: You think I own Batman... somebody call Arkham Asylum this guy is crazy... he thinks I own Batman. I know right? Signs of a madman... 1) T****hinking I own Batman** 2) T**alking to yourself :) seriously I don't own Batman or any Batman related characters**

* * *

By the time they had got themselves changed and sorted Bruce was already in the cave working at the computer.

"No" he didn't even look up

"But-" Damian started, he face in an expression of disbelief

"No, you're too young"

"Father;" when he was angry he sounded a lot like Bruce, so much so that the other boys took a slight, but noticeable, step sideways "I want to help and you can't stop me"

"Yes I can, and I will. If you are that desperate to help out you can help us in the cave but apart from that…" he didn't need to finish, his answer was obvious and Damian glared at him for it. Bruce glared back. To the others it was as if Mr Freeze had just attacked the cave with his Ice Gun; the chill radiating from the two was unmistakeable.

"Awww matching glares" Jason teased, breaking the tension. The three older boys started giggling until the glares fixed upon them and they shrunk back in nervous laughter. Dick elbowed his brother in a next-time-keep-your-mouth-shut kind of way, smiling all the while and Jason gave him the evils. Tim sighed; bringing a well needed change of subject he enquired about their target;

"So who are we after?" Taking it Bruce turned back to the computer screen;

"Gary Brimming; former Wayne Pharmaceuticals employee" seeing a couple of eyebrows rise he added "no he was not fired, he resigned. His letter of resignation said he was "moving on to a different chemical field". Shame really he was an excellent chemist, forward thinking and good in the practical assembly of new compounds…" his voice dropped in disappointment "he could have easily altered the drug used on your fellow pupils" This re-ignited burning questions in Dick's head;

"What's happening with the drug? Has Wayne Pharmaceuticals been able to reverse engineer the changes? Can they wake up Tony?" He regretted speaking so quickly, he was desperate for answers, but would only get them if Bruce could understand the questions. To his surprise when Bruce looked at the distress in his eyes he got up off his seat and drew Dick into an embrace that he couldn't help but sink into. Somehow that made everything okay; without needing to be told he knew his classmates were going to be fine. Bruce told him anyway.

"Wayne Enterprises is producing the antidote now, Tony will be fine by tomorrow, and back at school the day after." Dick smiled; all that was left to do was bring down the guy who did it. He walked over to the console, closely followed by the rest of the family. Bruce conveyed the information on the screen; "Intel places him; and one, yet unidentified, accomplice in an abandoned warehouse down by the docks. The plan is simple; in, out, minimum fuss; just bring him down" messing with kids was a tender spot for Bruce, this case hit him where it hurts, Dick knew that for sure. He could hear the anger boiling in his mentor's voice and when he started moving towards the car Dick Jason and Tim quickly followed, knowing it wasn't a good idea to annoy him further. Bruce sighed and came to a halt after seeing another figure moving in the shine of the black car.

"Damian…" he started; turning around and looking down at the child, now standing in front of him, with sad eyes "you can't come with us"

"But you said there are only two people… and I thought that; as it's not much, that I could, maybe come and help" Damian wouldn't want to admit it but his eyes were begging his father to let him tag along. Dick, Jason and Tim knew the feeling well from when they started out, being left at home when Batman and in the younger boys' case, the others, went on a mission was devastating and filled you with thoughts of; 'Am I not good enough?'; 'Does he not trust me?'. Bruce sighed and knelt down to Damian's eye level.

"This should be an easy mission, but if it's not, if something goes wrong… I've just found you, I can't lose you."

"But the others get to go…"

"Because they are older than you, they've been in these situations before. They know that, in this city, one person can be just as dangerous, sometimes more so, than one hundred."

"But how am I supposed to know when you never take me out!" Damian had a good point and Bruce smiled in reply;

"I promise that tomorrow you can come out on patrol" Damian still didn't give in, and Bruce relented "I'll tell you what; when we get back from the docks, if you are still awake, we can all go back out on patrol tonight." Damian looked at his father in disbelief and then broke out into a grin, it was only about five o'clock, and the night would still be early when they got home, there was no way he would be asleep. He gave his farther a quick squeeze and ran to the large and surprisingly comfy chair in front of the computer to wait for them.

* * *

Smiling the rest of them go into the car, when the door closed and engine was revving Tim said

"Damian's actually pretty cute when he's angry" Dick laughed, and smiling; nodded in agreement

"I heard that Drake… I am a trained assassin, **I am NEVER cute**"

"Oh great the kid's found the comm system" Jason breathed rolling his eyes, Dick took no notice and decided to join in the conversation

"Unless you're angry" he teased and added "… oh; or you've just come out of a shower and you're hair's all fluffy, that's pretty cute, and when you're in your school uniform, all done up nice, top button done up and everything. That has to be the cutest thing I've ever seen"

"Shut up Grayson… I am not cute"

"Yes you are"

"Not"  
"Are" this time Tim joined in, with a smile on his face trying very hard not to start laughing

"Not"

As the argument continued Bruce rolled his eyes, he couldn't wait to get to the docks and call for radio silence, but until then it was going to be a long drive.

* * *

"Why is it always warehouses?" Dick said breaking the silence, making Tim jump and Jason confused.

"Why is what always warehouses?"

"Where the bad guys hand out" Jason rolled his eyes and replied

"Because criminals lack originality" the boys smiled

"That is totally true" Dick said amazed "Half of them should be fined for plagiarism or something; I mean look at Cluemaster… a total Riddler rip off" they laughed, Dick slacking off their rogue gallery was a welcome distraction to the profound boredom that was: Batman scouting ahead.

"Why do they even do it to themselves… it's not our fault that some of them are utterly stupid. Case in point; Killer Moth, most stupid villain ever"

"Actually Jason that's Kiteman" The two older boys looked at Tim in a 'huh?' manner. Tim blushed "What?..." he whined "it was voted for on the internet" they rolled their eyes at the youngest member of their group.

"Only you Tim, only you" Jason laughed at him.

"Boys" the call came from Batman on their earpieces "meet me round the back of the warehouse, we're going in"

"Finally" Jason complained, patience was not his thing.

* * *

The back of the warehouse was an extremely creepy place to be. It was dark, cold and damp. The dark didn't matter much as they all had night-vision lenses in their masks, which only needed activating. It was the cold and damp that got to them. It was only September but the nights in Gotham were already reaching freezing and they were feeling the cold; even through their thermals in their costumes. Tim was the first to start shivering; pulling his cape around him didn't help much so whilst Batman was explaining the plan Dick put his arms around his brother in an attempt to keep them both warm.

The intel had been right, there were two people in the warehouse; one Batman confirmed as being Brimming the other was a female in her late forties. There were four windows in the warehouse, high on the walls at either end, they would use one each, then Red Robin and Batman would take one down and Red Hood and Nightwing had the other. Simple, effective, quick. Or so they had thought. The entrance worked, smashing their way through the glass they confronted their prey until Jason stopped, cocked his head to the side and merely stated

"Is that Ms Dougan; **the dinner lady**" he gave Dick an I-told-you-so glare which Dick just shrugged off and carried on runny towards her "Can I punch her now?" he asked earnestly but also mocking their previous conversation. He smiled at his brother who rolled his eyes. Batman overhearing their conversation added

"Feel free" with a smile whilst landing a punch on Brimming, square in face causing him to stagger backwards into Red Robin's bo staff who flicked it upwards causing Brimming to come crashing down to the floor and groan in pain. They secured him with hand cuffs and turned to watch the others taking down Mrs Dougan: the Dinner lady. Dick was taking her high and Jason low… it wasn't quite working out for them

"How much does she eat?" Jason complained getting a growl and smack from Mrs Dougan; "It's either that or you are a professional body builder"

"I came second at the recent IFPA competition **(1)** held here in Gotham… thank-you very much" she said as she kicked Jason square in the stomach sending him flying backwards landing with an "umph" and "That would explain a lot". After watching the two boys trying to take her down, but failing miserably, for a while Batman and Red Robin joined the fight. Punches and kicks flailed around for a few minutes before Tim got out a can of knock out gas and sprayed it in her face. She landed with a thud and spread a dust cloud around them. When it cleared Dick and Jason were looking at a smug Tim

"Why didn't we think about doing that?" Dick said quietly to their brother and all he could answer was

"Because we watch too much TV… 'Never escalate a battle unless your opponent forces you to'… wise words from a wise floating head." Dick rolled his eyes

"You mean **you **watch too much TV" Jason smiled and they burst out laughing until Tim interrupted them

"Urrr Batman?" he was standing over a stirring Gary Brimming "I don't think Brimming's behind this"

"Why not?" it was Jason who asked, but they didn't need an answer; Gary Brimming shot up, teeth gritted, nostrils flaring and pupil dilated, bloodshot eyes wide open, looking ready to kill until Tim sprayed him with knockout gas also.

"Sorry" Tim looked up at his mentor and shrugged; "automatic reaction". Batman rolled his eyes and sighed

"It's okay we weren't going to get any information from him in this state anyway"

"Well Dougan here isn't drugged" Dick said after checking her eyes

"I told you Dick it's always the evil dinner lady" Jason said content with himself, and walked over to Dick pompously with his head tilted backwards so he could look down his nose at him. Dick turned to face his brother and suddenly swacked him on the back of the head and started to sprint away with Jason quickly in pursuit determined to "Get him back for that"

"Will you two knock it off and get to work" Batman said whilst pouring over some chemical equipment that was obviously used to alter the drug. The boys stopped in their tracks and went to help Tim who was searching for the remaining drugs with Jason hitting Dick on the head as they went.

"How do you think they were getting the drug into him? No one in their right mind would drug themselves with that stuff more than once" Jason asked as he was going through a small office they had found at the back of the warehouse "Oooooh Cookies" Jason's eyes lit up and he remembered how hungry he felt and he took one.

"Jason NO" was the resounding shout that came from his brothers in the room, but too late he had already taken a bite. And replied with a muffled

"What?" through the cookie stuffed in his mouth. Then he began blinking slowly and creasing his forehead, he looked confused.

"Bro are you okay?" Dick asked earnestly approaching his brother with caution. Jason looked at him

"Yeah I'm fi-" he started coughing and held his head, then promptly fell to the floor and started convulsing. Dick looked up at Tim and simply said

"Get Batman" and Tim disappeared out of the room. Jason stopped moving and woke up his eyes and dilated and bloodshot as the others; and started shouting abuse at Nightwing who just rolled his eyes and held his brother on the ground for a few minutes until Batman came in

"What took you so long?" Batman glared at him

"Had to find this" he held up a syringe which held a yellow liquid that was obviously the antidote, and injected Jason with it, his eyes cleared and he groaned

"Oooooh bad cookies…"

"Brings a whole new dimension to 'come to the dark side; we have cookies'" Tim added with a smile then gave the half full cookie box to Batman "We… well Jason, found out how they were getting the drugs into him"

"Any sign of the rest of the drug?" Batman asked

"Negative… how much has already been recovered?"

"About four and a half kilograms were put into your sandwiches, I'm guessing there is another half a kilogram of the unaltered stuff in these" he motioned to the cookies "which still leaves 5 kilograms out there, and we won't know if it's altered or not until we can produce more of the antidote and Brimming wakes up or we get Ms Dougan out there to talk." He looked to Tim who sheepishly said

"The knock-out gas works for about 10 hours"

"Okay, I'm sure Bruce Wayne doesn't want to lose his best chemist, and so Brimming will get a visit in the hospital tomorrow, and I'm also sure Gordon won't mind us questioning **her**" he nodded to the unconscious Ms Dougan in the other room "tomorrow; let's call it a night. I have Brimming, Nightwing and Red Robin make sure everything is how we found it and once we are all out restart he security tapes, Red hood…" he paused and smiled "you tie Ms Dougan up securely," the three boys each raised an eyebrow "just in case," he added "so she can be taken by the police when they get here"

"Why do **I** have to tie **her **up, she's at least three times my weight!" Batman smirked

"Because you got detention today and I specifically told you not to" Jason stood mouth open.

"How the hell did you know, because I sure as hell didn't tell you" he passed stern glares at his brothers, who stood there solidly denying it. Batman just laughed

"I'm Batman" he simply said and walked away with Brimming over his shoulder leaving Jason standing there formulating the ways he could have found out. It was cruel he knew but worth it to see the confused and angry look on Jason's face for a while.

* * *

They sat in the car for a while; first, because they were waiting for the police to arrive, then Bruce insisted they wait for the ambulance to take Brimming to Gotham General. Once everything was sorted Batman shared a nod with the Commissioner, got in the car, and they were off. At first the car was in an awkward silence until Dick couldn't take it anymore, he was always the chatty one of the group.

"You just had to eat the cookie" he said rolling his eyes

"What? I was hungry…"

"We were in a warehouse that was home to a drugged guy and you think it's a good idea to **EAT THE COOKIE**"

"I WAS HUNGRY" Jason insisted

"Jay; you're **always** hungry"

"I'm not anymore"

"So the next time we want you to stop complaining about being hungry we just drug you… nice to know" Dick said with a smile and Tim snorted with laughter, even Bruce smirked at the comment and replied

"I'll make sure Alfred has the Manor well stocked up" Jason glared at his father who glanced at him "If looks could kill…" the boys giggled and even Jason's expression lifted. It was still a long trip back to the cave.

* * *

"Jason; go to bed" came the order when the car stopped.

"Why?"

"Because you ate a drugged cookie and went completely psycho for a couple of minutes" Dick finished for Bruce

"Oh so that's how it is it? **Dick?**" he made sure he emphasised his name. He then felt a hand make light, almost playful, contact with the back of his head

"Stop bulling you brother and go to bed, you look beat and I don't want to put your body under more strain tonight after you 'ate a drugged cookie and went completely psycho for a couple of minutes'" Bruce teased

"Todd ate a drugged cookie and went completely psycho for a **couple of minutes**? Really? He's not already completely psycho?" Damian said from the chair they had left him in, still in his Robin costume, ready to go.

They all laughed, except Jason who, fuming, stomped to the elevator up to the Manor. Giving his youngest brother the evils before the doors shut and the lift propelled him upwards.

"You ready" Batman asked his son, who nodded furiously, bright blue eyes shining with excitement obviously unable to respond. Damian was given a piggyback ride to the car by Dick and couldn't stop giggling after he almost slipped backwards and had to grab onto the first thing he could to save himself; which turned out to be Dick's nose. Dick snorted as the little fingers of his baby brother cling onto his nose.

"It's official, Dick would make a rubbish pig, he just didn't have the nose for it." Tim joked as they got into the car and drove off.

The Gotham City skyline was a spectacle at night, but from the view of the Batmobile's window it held an even more enchanting ambience. The old tall buildings were no longer imposing or daunting to him. He was Robin the Boy Wonder and criminals would rue the day they decided to commit a crime in his father's city.

* * *

"_**Ms Dougan you have failed me" the high pitched voice pierced the darkness like a knife through butter. Ms Dougan trembled;**_

"_**B-b-but I escaped, the-they learnt n-n-nothing from m-me" she stuttered**_

"_**You were caught, you are a liability. You are worthless to me." At first she didn't feel the sword cut through her body. That was shock mostly. She drew a sharp intake of air, but then she couldn't breathe. The shock melted away and the pain ran though her body. She shook, causing the blade to do even more damage. She started coughing, it was dry at first, but then it turned red as blood started filling her lungs. She took one last look at her killer who just laughed at her. He withdrew his sword and she fell to the floor motionless, wiping the blood off on her clothes he gave his sword to one of his many minions, who took it and bowed. The man sat back down and rested his elbows on the table in front of him and clasped his hands together and looked straight ahead at the computer screen in front of him.**_

"_**Activate phase 3" he said still looking at the pictures the newly deceased Ms Dougan had taken before her passing. He ran his fingers over the faces of the four boys "I'm going to have some fun with you… Yes lots of fun indeed."**_

* * *

**Oooooh cliffhanger... you won't get a resolution in the next chapter, sorry but there will be one in the future I promise... unless you all turn around and say my writing is horrible you hate the story and never want to read my writing again... because then you won't get another chapter 'cause I'll be too busy lying on my bed crying my eyes out. **

**Nah, I don't mind constuctive criticism, in fact I welcome it, as long as you ****aren't** down right mean :) ... that is my way of saying please review and tell me what you think; give me chemistry mishaps; ideas for future stories you want me to do; say hi... seriously every review alert I get makes my day... so thank-you everyone who has reviewed so far :)

**Okay another apology, I am writing this in the middle of the night and I write strange things in the middle of the night... sorry :)**

**(1) No I do not follow professional body building, I had to use the internet**

**Also give yourself a virtual cookie (nice triple chocolate chip ones, not nasty drugged ones) if you spotted the Power Rangers reference, and another (in fact take a few) if you got the Newsarama countdowns reference ;)**

**Okay I'm done... actually DeathwishJV I have a Damian centered chapter planned just for you :)... Now I'm done, I hoped you enjoyed the chapter, please review**

**Supernova95 :D**


	5. 21: Ooops, I meant to do that

**Hello people, sorry about the long wait... I started back at collage after study leave, who would have thought I would get so much homework in the first week back, and I managed to sprain my ankle on top of a mountain... (never do that it is a very bad idea... it is also very difficult to get off the mountain)... you would have thought that would have meant I had more time to write... but alas no. Although I did make the strange discovery that I have some really good ideas when I am in pain... at least I think their good, however it could just be the pain talking. I know this is just excuses but to be perfectly honest Jason was just being stubborn.**

**THANK-YOU to EVERYONE who has reviewed, it made lying in bed nursing my ankle, and walking around with a stupid stick because the hospital wouldn't give me crutches a whole lot easier :)**

**Okay Chapter 5: I have tried to be fluffy... so please tell me if it was fluffy enough/too fluffy/just right as I know some of you wanted more fluff, but I may have gone OTT**

**Disclaimer 1:**

** PLEASE, PRETTY PRETTY PLEASE do not try any of these things at home or in chemistry classes. I have done all but the last one ( although we did plaster our school with coloured bath bombs, but that's another story altogether), or they have been done in my class and they should NEVER EVER be repeated (by the way I have gone a little hyperbolic with thses situations) but still DON'T do it...**

**Disclaimer 2:**

**I don't own Batman... or any copper sulphate... wait actually I think I might... but I defiantly DON'T own Batman **

* * *

You could always tell when the chemistry department had decided on its new classes; there was always one teacher that walked around the high school with a contorted facial expression that was a mixture of fear, exasperation, anger and anxiety... They normal drew lots and the one who drew the short straw got Jason Todd in their chemistry class. It was, to them, a fate worse than death.

* * *

**Thermometers are supposed to do that… Right?: (no Celticlily they are not)**

It was their first time using Bunsen burners, an exciting time for everyone, except Jason. All they were supposed to be doing was boiling some water, what were they five? All you need to do is stick it in a kettle and let that do the boiling, but no they were learning about states and so HAD to boil some water in a beaker to see the conversion of liquid to gas… how boring can science get? Therefore, they were given thermometers to check the temperature every once in a while. Bad idea. The minute he saw the mercury rise he was intrigued by it. The slow moving liquid rising in a glass tube had a mesmerising quality, almost hypnotising him at once. He didn't know what persuaded him to do it but he picked up the thermometer out of the slowly heating water and put it directly in the Bunsen flame. The mercury shot up and he withdrew it smiling, almost giggling. His eyes lit up, he let the liquid metal return to a more normal temperature and did it again. It was surprising how amusing it was to see the metal rise and fall in such a way. Then he thought, what would happen if he left the thermometer in the flame? It seems stupid now, but at the time… well let's just say he was **very** bored. He looked around just to make sure no one was looking at him… plausible deniability he told himself, then he put the thermometer back in the flame and held it there, it shot up again, but when it got to the top; nothing happened. Well that was boring, he told himself and was about to take it out of the flame when the bottom exploded; spurting mercury absolutely everywhere, his cloths, books, hair, he was very protective over his hair. How was he going to get the mercury out of his hair before he got home? He did not feel like being cornered by either Bruce or Alfred about this... They would one; force him to go through a de-mercurifying _(yes I do know that is not a word neologisms are how I roll)_ process that would be painfully humiliating and two; they would totally know this didn't happen by accident and ground him for like a month. His brothers would totally have the satisfaction of being able to blackmail him about this, well they would call it teasing... It was still blackmail. After letting out a, thankfully manly, scream the teacher came over to see what had happened. Usually he was the epitome of witty excuses… today he drew a blank. How the heck would he explain why his thermometer blew up without getting a detention? He could feel the teacher breathing down his neck

"Jason; what happened?"

"I…I don't know, it just kind of exploded…" all he could do was hope. The teacher took the thermometer from his hand looked at it being careful not to touch the mercury

"Hmmm, must have been a faulty thermometer, maybe the pressure in the inner tube was too high, Jason you need to get yourself cleaned up, mercury can be dangerous." Still in disbelief of what had just happened Jason made his way to the lab technicians who would help rid him of the mercury… a teacher hadn't given him a detention and he had **actually** done something wrong. It was a miracle. He felt a smile come to his lips; he pressed it away remembering that he was playing the unsuspecting pupil, but he couldn't wait to tell Dick later. What a story this would be…

* * *

**It was cold okay…: (for Superminion)**

Gotham was not the warmest place in winter; nor was the Gotham High science department when the boiler brakes. He hadn't meant for it to get that big, he had just meant to build a small bonfire out of the excess splints on his table so that his freezing cold hands would warm up. He didn't have to use all the splints in the classroom; but he thought he would, to increase the spectacle. That was the last time the teacher let him sit out of his line-of-sight. Jason got a heat proof mat and set it in front of him; he then started fiddling with the splints on his table setting them up in a traditional bonfire type of way. Absent mindedly he started ripping pages out of his workbook, tearing them up into small pieces and rolled them into balls, incorporating them in his bonfire. Then he went to fine some more splints to make it taller, bigger. The last splint he lit and added to the pile. Within about twenty seconds it was a raging inferno on the heat proof mat; that, as it turned out, wasn't so heatproof. He tried to swat the fire out, but only managed to spread the burning splints across his table setting books and blazers alight. It was then when the fire alarm sounded and the teacher doused the whole table with a fire extinguisher, before they completely evacuated. Somehow the fire had survived its dousing and needed the Gotham City Fire Department to finally put it out. Jason had received a suspension for two weeks and three months detention after that. Bruce assured the principal that; one, he would pay for the new science lab and would also renovate the rest as a gesture of good will; and two, he **would **reprimand Jason at home, which meant no patrols; no video games; a practiced glare, that was worse than even the Bat glare, from both Bruce and Dick that said… 'well you did burn down a science lab' but worst of all… none of Alfred's world famous double chocolate chip cookies. A month without Alfred's cookies… it was torture.

* * *

**Why would you trust him with that?: ... (for Celticlily)**

It was their first lesson on evaporation and their teacher had decided to do a "simple experiment" with them... "simple experiment" was an oxymoron in Jason's book; no experiment worth doing was simple and he didn't want to do a boring one, but boring it was. All they were doing was mixing a solution with more water, boiling a bit off then leaving it to evaporate naturally to leave a solid. Jason wasn't bothered until their teacher said there would be a competition to see who could get the biggest crystals. Now Jason was determined. To say he had a bit of a competitive streak was the understatement of the millennia. Thankfully nothing blew up this time, and he was a little annoyed that his teacher had to observe EVERYTHING he did; from setting up his equipment to measuring out his copper sulphate... And completely blames the pressure he was put under for dropping the brown tinted jar on his foot and spilling it all over the floor.

His teacher sighed and mentioned for him to go to the lab technicians who would clean it up and bring out a new jar.

On the whole he thought his experiment went extremely well, he didn't blow anything up; burn himself; set the lab on fire. Today was a good day to be in chemistry... Or not.

"Uh-oh" he pulled his bleeding finger out of his mouth. He had just dropped his evaporating dish in the sink and it had smashed. Stupidly he had put his hand in to retrieve the broken pieces and cut his finger. Like most people his immediate reaction was to suck it so it would stop bleeding. He hadn't noticed it was coated with copper sulphate crystals, until his mouth started to burn. His eyes widened and he started coughing and spluttering.. His mouth felt like it was on fire.

"Sir, sir," he got his teacher's attention. He was looked over. His teacher's eyes lingered on his cut finger

"Just go and get a plaster from the office Jason" his teacher seemed unconcerned.

"No sir, I swallowed some copper sulphate" his teacher's eyes widened in panic.

"How?"

"I had some on my finger sir, and when I cut myself I immediately put it in my mouth sir" he was trying to sound as innocent as he could, but after burning down one of the science labs the teachers all held a curtain amount of mistrust for him.

"Sit." he gestured to the seat in front of his desk and disappeared into the technician's room. Jason started to feel woozy, his head was spinning and he felt like he was going to throw up... Okay he **was** going to throw up. He didn't really have time to turn around so he could throw up on the floor, so instead he managed to completely plaster the teacher's desk in his partially digested breakfast. The class burst out laughing and Jason couldn't help but smile; until their teacher came back in of course. His expression dropped as his teacher's face turned red and his facial features contorted in anger, then he breathed a sigh and relaxed. Jason retreated sheepishly into his chair.

"Drink this, you should be fine; it wasn't a very concentrated dose but even so we have called an ambulance, to take you to Gotham General, to make sure. Your father will meet you there. They will also need look over your hand as it is possible copper sulphate will have also entered your system through your cut." Jason started to gulp down the water he had been given. It wasn't doing anything for the burning sensation that he had in his mouth, throat and stomach. Hopefully Bruce would be all worried about him, he liked that feeling... Then again this was the third time in one year he had messed up in chemistry.

* * *

**Nobody told me they were smoke matches...: (for Celticlily… again)**

"I can't believe you set off the fire alarm again...!" the hiss came from behind him as he was waiting to be picked up at the end of the day. He tuned to see Tim directly behind him and Dick holding Damian's hand, walking towards them but a little further back.

"I didn't mean to" then seeing his brother's I-don't-believe-you face he added "I promise I didn't mean to set off the fire alarm." he whined in earnest his brother rolled his eyes and stepped around him to lean against the school gate. Jason was just about to turn to greet Dick and Damian when he felt a sharp slap on the back of his head.

"What was that for?" he turned to his brother already knowing the answer. He was glared at in reply. However Damian decided to add his two cents

"That was for making me stand out in the rain for half an hour Todd" Jason's heart nearly melted just looking at his brother, his hair was all fluffy and Dick and Tim were right, he was exceptionally cute when he was angry. The three eldest boys shared a surreptitious 'awwww' look, which quickly turned to disappointed frowns at Jason.

"I promise you Little D I did not set off the fire alarm on purpose, and this time it wasn't even completely my fault." he stared blankly at three disbelieving faces. "It wasn't" he took a deep breath "we were doing an experiment with different fuels, to see which one burnt with the most energy... And seeing as how I used up the school's supply of splints when I... Urm... *cough* burnt down a science lab *cough* and they haven't been able to get anymore in... That or they just don't trust me with them. Either way we didn't have any splints so we had to use matches... And I kinda maybe sorta picked up the wrong ones..." Dick's eyes narrowed and Jason, seeing this, quickly carried on his story "I didn't know they weren't proper matches when I first picked them up" he assured "and Jenny was there too, she agreed with me when we picked them up that they were the ones we were supposed to use. Anyway when we tried to strike the match, nothing really happened. There was a small flame and then it went out and started billowing out smoke. We thought it was a faulty match so we lit another one and the same thing happened... And then they wouldn't stop smoking" Tim sniggered with laughter

"What?" Damian asked earnestly. Tim looked up at Jason with a huge grin on his face, obviously struggling to contain his laughter. Jason just glared at him.

"Jason picked up smoke matches." then at his Damian's continued confusion "you don't know what a smoke match is? What did they teach you in the league of assassins" he tutted, teasing Damian was one of his favourite pastimes.

"Only how to kill you in one hundred and one different ways...without leaving a trace" he finished in a whisper

"Okay... I was only teasing Damian..." he elongated his first word raising an eyebrow.

"Oh... I can still kill you in one hundred and one different ways Drake" a first Damian sounded put down but then he quirked up in reminding his brother how many ways he really could kill him.

"And I still know what smoke matches are" their eyes narrowed, until Dick saw it fit to break them up, for his and Jason's sanity. "Anyway" Tim continued, still watching Damian from the corner of his eyes "smoke matches are basically like normal matches but instead of lighting with a flame they just literally billow out smoke, and they are a devil to put out."

"You're telling me" Jason finished.

"Soooo you and Jenny set off the fire alarms... With smoke matches" Dick asked.

"Yeah... And?"

"Nothing, it's just I would have expected something a little more spectacular from you Jay, I mean; smoke matches?"

"You weren't there, it was spectacular."

"How was smoke matches setting off a fire alarm spectacular?"

"Well... It wasn't just two smoke matches... We panicked and kinda accidentally set fire to the whole box… and then we tried to put them out, and nothing would work… even dousing them in a whole sink full of water didn't work. I swear they were waterproof smoke matches." Dick and Tim burst out laughing Damian just looked more annoyed.

"You mean to tell me Todd that I stood outside in the pouring rain for half an hour, making my hair go all fluffy, because you panicked... Has father taught you nothing, or are you just too much of a stupid headstrong idiot to take any notice of him!" he started talking in his usual calm demeanour but ended up shouting at him, leaving the boys staring at him, mouths open, in a stunned silence. Weirdly, that had actually hurt. As much as he didn't like to admit it, he **always** listened to Bruce; who had, of course, saved his life in more than one way. Jason almost punched his youngest brother for insinuating otherwise. The only reason that he didn't was because Tim and Dick had seen the glint of anger in his eyes. Tim had stepped in front of him capturing his eye contact; somehow calming him done with a single glance and Dick had made a tension relieving offhand comment like he always did.

"Okay, note made. Damian is even more protective of his hair than Jason is". Even with the situation diffused Jason refused to even glance at Damian all the way home and stormed off to his room the minute they stepped in the door, only coming out when he heard Bruce get home from work, walk upstairs and close the door to his study.

He ran silently up to the door and knocked as quietly as he could, after waiting for the soft "come in" from his dad, he opened the door a crack surveying the room for **him **before opening the door just enough to get in and quietly closed it after himself. He shuffled forward, head hung in shame, until he was about a metre from Bruce's desk. There were a couple of moments of awkward silence as each expected the other to start the conversation. Bruce caved.

"Jason what's wrong?" he said stopping everything he was doing to concentrate fully on his son.

"I'm Sorry"

"Jason?" came Bruce's bemused reply

"I'm sorry" he looked up at his father, his eyes were threatening with tears, and Jason was confused. This wasn't like him; he didn't cry and he didn't apologise when he had done nothing wrong, in fact he usually didn't apologise when he had done something wrong; his was completely new territory for him. He couldn't explain why he felt like apologising to his father save for the fact that Damian's words still rang clear in his head and he had come to the conclusion that if Damian though he never listened to Bruce then Bruce must think that also… and he couldn't deal with that.

"Sorry? For what Jason?" Did he really have to explain it? He took a deep breath

"I'm sorry for" he faltered and took another deep breath looking his surrogate father in the eyes "I'm sorry for setting off the fire alarm today, and for burning down the science lab and for not going to bed when you tell me and…"

"Jason…" Bruce tried to interject, but failed dismally

"for that time when you took me to Japan and I disagreed with the airplane food and threw up over your business associate and lost you that deal **(1)** and for wetting the bed until I was 10 and for not being patient on stake outs and for spilling that stuff down my first costume so that I got a new one because I thought my first costume was hideous"

"Jason" he tried again

"and for stealing Dick's teddy bear when I was seven because I couldn't go to sleep without it and didn't want to admit it to Dick and for not doing my homework and for pretending to be sick because I didn't want to go to school…"

"**Jason**" Bruce finally got his attention "Come here…" he pushed his chair back and swivelled it out to the side arms open waiting for his eleven-year-old to jump into his lap, which he did without hesitation. Bruce spent a few minutes shushing him, rocking him too and throw and holding him tightly, letting him cry into his shoulder for as long as he needed. He desperately wanted to stop crying but somehow he just couldn't. Once his sobs had subsided Bruce held him at arm's length, looked him in the eye, and asked quietly "Jason, what's brought this on?" it sent him into a fresh bout of crying and he hugged himself tightly to his dad.

"I-it's j-just that D-Damian s-said that I d-don't listen to y-you" he managed to get out between sobs "a-and if D-Damian t-thought that I d-don't listen t-to you t-then you mu-must feel t-the same way" Bruce held him closer; he seemed to understand what he was saying. Then he was back to shushing him, and stroking the back of his hair, comforting him.

"Jason, don't you ever think that." Knowing exactly how he felt. All Jason wanted was to be accepted and loved. To everyone else that meant accepting an arrogant eleven-year-old boy who got himself into trouble more often than not; but Bruce wasn't everyone else. Bruce meant to world to Jason and he tried his hardest to impress him, he tried too hard sometimes, which just usually ended in disaster, but he always listened to Bruce, simply out of his love and respect for him. "Oh and Jason…" he looked up and grunted a yes "… please don't punch your brother for suggesting that you don't; it won't end well" Jason broke into a sheepish smile and hugged his reply. "Now how about we go downstairs and find Alfred, I think he has made a batch of his world famous double chocolate chip cookies" Jason looked at him for a moment and then smiled

"Alright but" his expression turned menacing "not a mention of this to the others" Bruce chuckled and nodded realising he was talking about his 'street cred'

"My lips are sealed" and they got up Jason practically running to the door shouting

"Race you downstairs" Bruce laughed and ran after him with the determination to tickle him.

* * *

**April Fools' Day + Jason + Water Balloons Full of Permanent Dye = Disaster (for Ryotanimoto16) **

It had been bugging him for weeks... What to do on April Fools' Day. It wasn't until the week before; when they were making bath bombs that he got an idea. All the science teachers had to wear white lab coats that he, for one, thought were extremely boring; therefore, for April fool's day, he was going to change that.

It took him at least an hour to set up, thankfully he had a free before chemistry and no one used the classroom in that time. Catapults, rope, water balloons, everything he needed. He had of course already told his class what he was doing; well most of them, the ones who would think of it as a good joke and not tell on him. They promised that their teacher would be the first to grace the door.

It was almost time for his lesson to start so he picked up his stuff, leaving his finished project and a camera and jumped out of the ground floor chemistry lab's window to join the rest of his class who would be starting to gather outside, waiting for the spectacle. He knew it was going to work; he had tried it out on Tim the day before. Who had proceeded to chase him around the manor for the rest of the night, yelling at him, until Bruce calmed him down… something about his favourite bunny rabbit now being a mixture of red blue yellow, and all the colours in-between. The rest of the household had been in fits of giggles the whole time, even Alfred grinned a little.

He rounded the corner in his usual skulking to chemistry style, not letting anything on, oh this was going to be so good. He friends looked at him, he smiled and they grinned back. Nobody was usually allowed to go into the chemistry lab before the teacher, dangerous chemicals and everything, sometimes they slipped in, but today they made sure nobody did. Their teacher was five minutes late, five minutes that passed painfully slowly. Then he rounded the corner, they formed an orderly line and waited for him to open the door. Then all hell broke loose.

Everything happened perfectly, the string tautened when the door opened causing the water balloons to be flung at him, bursting on impact and spraying him with an array of different colours. They covered more of him than Jason expected and their teacher had turned away from the door to escape the bombardment, only to get his back completely covered as well. The whole class burst out laughing, he received a few surreptitious pats on the back, a couple from some of the people in his class that he just didn't expect to get a pat on the back from. Once the bombardment had finished they entered the classroom. Their teacher was livid and he stalked away to 'get cleaned up' Jason retrieved his camera and put it away in his bag. He smiled at the footage that was going up on youtube that night, he smiled even more that none of his class ratted him out. Everyone knew he had done it but, where was the proof?

* * *

**Thanks for reading, please review**

******Ryotanimoto16, I thought this would be funnier than spilling chemicals :)**

******Celticlily: remind you of good times? ;)**

******(1) ... Yes I have thrown up on an airplain before... Blame British airways... They gave a five year old an adults dinner..Totally not my fault ;)**


	6. 31: First Flight

**Can I just take this opportunity to thank Celticlily for pointing out my spelling mistakes... 'Tim noodled vigorously' :/ oops, if there is anything else you guys spot please don't hesitate to PM or Review and I will put it right, thanks :) **

* * *

**Okay... I would really appreciate some feedback on this chapter, because I'm not sure how good it is.**

**The beginning is something I wrote whilst on a college trip to Geneva... which is an amazing place, I recommend everyone to go there at some point in their lives. And the second part is plot building for the next chapter.**

**DeathwishJV: I'm sorry Damian isn't really in this one at all but I promise ****the next two chapters are going to be Damian centric (the second more than the first) but it is going to be quite Damian and Tim fluffy... I'm really excited about finishing it and sharing it. :D**

******Thank-you EVERYONE who has reviewed and alerted, you have been making my day for almost a month now :)**

******So... ENJOY THE CHAPTER**

******Disclaimer: I do not own Batman or any DC e.c.t. related characters :) ... or snow white, or grumpy (although I am sometimes very grumpy)**

* * *

His heart was racing... Even though he knew it shouldn't be. It was his first time, nobody would blame him, but he just wasn't supposed to feel happy at the moment. If he remembered that then maybe the feeling would go away. It didn't. As if working against his wishes his heart beat increased in speed and ferocity, he thought it was going to thump straight out of his chest. They had been waiting for about five minutes at his point. It wasn't long but it just built up his excitement. He looked at his brothers around him, Dick was smiling as ever; reading some old newspaper clippings about Haley's Circus in a scrapbook Bruce had given him for his birthday. Jason was hunched over and bored, he was playing on his Nintendo looking like Grumpy off Snow White. Tim on the other hand couldn't stop grinning, not just smiling, grinning. The sides of his mouth stretched from ear to ear, his eyes wide, bright and alert to everything going on around him. He didn't want to miss a moment of it. He smiled at Bruce, Bruce smiled back.

"First time on a plane kiddo?" he nodded vigorously, Bruce laughed. Ha may not be his real dad, but He was sure glad that Bruce had adopted him... wanted him.

The engine, of the Wayne private jet, started and butterflies fluttered in his stomach. His smile broadened and a quiet giggle graced his lips. This was so... Thrilling, exciting, he didn't quite know how to describe it. He was suddenly jerked backwards, they were moving. Faster, faster until his stomach flipped; ears popped and they were inclining. It was amazing. The rush. This must be how Dick felt every time he let go of a trapeze. How they all feel when they go out on patrol, grappling from building to building; just that feeling must be more intense. To feel the wind in your hair, to have butterflies every time you step off a roof, adrenaline coursing through your veins... The thrill. His desire to join their crusade just increased tenfold, he promised himself that once they got home from their trip he would work extra hard just so he could see how it truly felt. He had originally wanted to become Robin when his parents were murdered; he was doing it for them. But then he saw how fun it was, to learn, work, and play, to hang out with his new brothers, to eat Alfred's cooking; and now to feel the thrill of flying. He was going to do it for himself as well.

The city was getting smaller and smaller beneath them, cars on motorways became ants scurrying along, minding their own business, then it disappeared completely; they were flying over the ocean on their way to The UN in Geneva. Bruce had been invited to give a talk to world leaders about what the Wayne Foundation's work in Northern Africa and the numerous natural disaster sights currently going on around the world, focussing mainly on Wayne Tech's new nuclear clean up technologies, and also it's earthquake excavation technologies, but Bruce also planned to talk about how to improve relief efforts for disaster areas, as he currently thought they were un-economical and ineffective. Tim had only ever been out of Gotham once, and that had been a school trip to metropolis, let alone half way around the world... He wondered if they could visit CERN, science had always interested him, and they were in the middle of a 15 month shut down to upgrade their systems... Maybe they could see the detectors. He would have to ask Bruce. But later, now he was being distracted by the window. The sun was high in the sky and there were now clouds. He could barely see where the sea stopped and sky started, but the beautiful glistening sunlight sparkled on the uneven sea. Like a thousand diamonds bobbing on the surface. He just kept on smiling.

* * *

The airplane jerked a bit; but the boy's grin didn't waver, and Bruce smiled. He remembered his first flight; as a boy his father had an old biplane, it still worked perfectly and his dad would take him up whenever he could. He could still remember how amazing it felt. The wind in your hair; the stomach churning loop the loops and gut wrenching flips. Not being able to hear your whoops and yells above the roar of the propellers. He even remembers it sometimes when he leaps off buildings in the middle of the night, and has to suppress the want to forget all about his mission and submit to the thrill of it. But he can't, Batman can't. Robin however was a different subject completely. Robin (both of them) needed the thrill, the excitement, they live off it. Bouncing around, throwing quips at villains like they are at some carnival. Dick in particular needed it, the young trapeze artist was used to throwing himself around night after night, and he needed an output, something that would quench his thirst for excitement; to be perfectly honest he was an adrenaline junky... And somehow Bruce was okay with that. Alfred leaned in, and looking over at Tim said;

"Master Bruce, I do believe we have another bird who finds a thrill in flying" Bruce looked up at his butler and simply said;

"That we do Alfred… that we do."

* * *

Robin smiled as he looked down at the street below. Cars were honking their horns; people were striding along, impatient to be on their way. Although all the lights in the city were on Gotham was as dark as ever. 'Part of its character' he dad would always say... He smiled again. He had done it... He was good enough to be Robin. He was going to fly. His parents would be so proud.

"What you thinking about Babybird?"

"The first time I ever flew" Jason looked confused as Tim gave his answer. And Tim laughed a bit. "That trip to Geneva we took a couple of months ago" Jason's forehead creased in concentration, and then his face opened in realisation.

"What the one where you got lost at CERN, and had basically got a job offer by the time we found you?... Smartypants." Tim blushed;

"Yes THAT one"

"Wait that was the first time you had ever flown?" Tim nodded smiling at the memory "Why didn't you say something? Dick and I just thought you really needed to go to the bathroom or something" Tim raised an eyebrow and Jason looked away "What? You're like seven... Seven-year-olds do that..." he grinned, a sheepish grin and Tim sighed, rolling his eyes at his brother... Not that Jason could see them of course.

"What like nine year olds scream like girls when they fall out of a white water raft?" the white water rafting had been one of the best parts of the trip. So much better than Bruce's boring meeting. Jason however had failed dismally at the 'staying in the raft' bit; and had found out the hard way that melt water from Mount Blanc was absolutely freezing **(1)**. Jason's eyes narrowed, Tim could tell even if he couldn't see them, he had a knack for that.

"I did not"

"Did too"

"Did not"

"Did too, and I have the pictures to prove it" at that Jason launched himself playfully at his brother ruffling his hair and they ended up wrestling each other to the ground in fits of giggles.

"You two love birds coming or not?" Dick asked seeking up behind them, ninja style, and making them both jump out of their skins.

"Dick" Jason insulted in a low growl. Dick didn't take the hint.

"Duuuude, so not cool... It's Nightwing remember; only code names on patrol" Dick replied whining slightly in a humorous manner. This time it was Jason's turn to raise an eyebrow.

"Duuuude, I really was calling you a dick." Jason whined back, mocking his brother. Tim burst into suppressed giggles and Dick swatted Jason on the back of the head commenting on how he shouldn't say that in the presence of a seven year old. Tim glared at them for patronising him; they glared back, both breaking into smiles as they did so. Tim loved his new family, he would never stop loving or forget his old one, but they would be happy he had found a new, kind caring, loving and all around awesome one. Although they were all overprotective of him, they made his day bright and sunny; even in Gotham. Once the giggling had died down they set their minds to the task at hand... Robin's first ever patrol. Batman was waiting for them, waiting for them to go flying. Robin smiled at the thought. Batman smiled back... Bruce looked funny smiling in his batman suit... It wasn't natural.

"You ready?" he asked as the bat signal lit up the clouds behind him. Robin smiled his reply. Batman stood back and Robin ran, jumped and let himself free fall; let himself feel the thrill of flying before shooting out a line and letting himself swing towards GCPD. It was definitely the best moment of his life so far. The stomach churning butterflied had been worth it. The past few months of gruelling hard work had been worth it. It was like climbing a mountain. It's hard getting up, tiring; exhausting, but getting to the top is the best feeling ever. He had reached the top and was now enjoying the view; and he was loving every minute of it.

* * *

_The man was sitting in front of a computer screen, his eyes fixated as he studied his subjects. Four boys, all in Gotham high. The cameras picked up their every move at the beloved school of theirs. At some points he could swear that they had known he was watching them... But he reminded himself that that was crazy talk... Nobody short of the Batman would notice his cameras... Okay so maybe a few of the other freaks, the super-powered ones. But not four helpless little boys, no they were not super-powered... And defiantly not Batman's, little gaggle of birdies. How could they be, none possessed the qualities of Batman's sidekicks... Especially intelligence... They were definitely lacking in intelligence, well apart from the nine year old, he was a certified super genius. They looked like normal school kids; but everyone knew they weren't. They were Gotham's favourite sons, made special by their father, and their father alone. It made him sick, how society could treat them different, make them special, when people like his son drowned in the depths of nothingness. He wanted revenge, revenge on the rich for thinking they were better than everyone else. He had started his revenge, striking at their hearts; their children. He had made them see that not even their children were safe in their high up school of theirs, that they deemed necessary to lock the gates of, even way in the outback of Bristol. He had made them afraid... Now he was going to do more._

_"Master, it is done" the voice came from behind him. The surveillance tape flickered as it was paused. The man didn't turn towards the voice but kept staring at the paused screen, a menacing grin spread across his face_

_"Good and the instructions"_

_"Delivered, but Master, I doubt he will take any notice, he is an unpredictable lunatic, one who doesn't take orders from anyone"_

_"Not orders, no but the suggestion has been implanted, and he is crazy enough to act on it."_

_"Master he could kill them; I didn't think you wanted that to happen"_

_"Not the elder ones, my son has begrudgingly grown attached to them. But the new one, the little one; the blood relation, he can rot in hell. I have seen him on the television, and in surveillance. He is an arrogant, egotistical, pompous, egocentric little brat. Why anyone puts up with him is beyond me. But as they say, blood is thicker than water, his untimely destruction, if that is what it may come to, will hurt their community the most, and especially the Waynes..." he paused his grin broadened and voice quietened "Especially the Waynes", he hated them more than anyone in the world. So high and mighty, thinking they can solve Gotham's; and ultimately the world's, problems by throwing money at it. He was determined to show them that there were problems that can't be solve with any amount of money. Like some unknown person drugging all their children, or a raving mad lunatic, who just happened to escape from Arkham the day before coming and killing a poor defenceless kindergarten kid. He laughed. It was chilling to listen to, sending cold shock waves throughout the room causing his minions to step back and bow their heads in fear. He liked it when they did that. It made him feel powerful and in charge. He liked being in charge. Being in charge was fun._

* * *

**He he, I can't wait to get the next chapter to you guys**

**Please Review :)**

**(1) Celticlily seems to think I have experience at this... I would just like to mention that whilst I did go white water rafting with my college, I did not fall out of the raft at all... my teacher did, but I did not. I did however use the raft as a spring board and flip in a couple of times, which was fun, BUT DID NOT FALL IN... that is all :) **

**Supernova95 :D**


	7. 41: The Joker Goes to School

**Yay a new chapter... sorry it has taken so long- stupid college (which is now finished for the summer WOOOOOOOOOOOOO! so hopefully I will be updating more :D ) but at least you get a mega chapter for your wait :)**

**I figured out how to reply to reviews the other day (and was very excited about it)... yes I know it has taken me a month -_-* but now everyone who reviews will get a nice little personal message from me telling them just hoe much they made me smile... so please review... pretty please with ice creme and chocolate sprinkles and a flake on top and toffee sauce and chocolate fudge brownie bits...**

**Also I would like to take this opportunity to apologize... this is my first time writing the Joker... so if anyone wants to tell me how I did it would be much appreciated (and if anyone had any advice that would be appreciated also).  
**

**So enough of me... enjoy the chapter :)**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Batman do you really think I would be sitting here going through state education to get a mundane job (although being an astrophysist isn't mundane). No I would be out there writing about the character I own, getting in money from all the movies, cartoons e.c.t. so therefore as I am sitting here... it just shows that I DO NOT OWN BATMAN.**

**Oh yeah... any suggestions for future stories are ALWAYS welcome :)**

* * *

Suddenly the realisation came over Damian, everything he had been taught was wrong. He knelt in stunned silence and; as he stared at the blood pooling in front of him, he realised, for the first time in his life; that blood was in fact not thicker than water.

* * *

The day had begun like any other. An argument started over breakfast between Tim and Damian. Well argument was the wrong word to use, it was more like Damian sitting there whilst Tim cried and shouted at him. Something about Damian not respecting him; taking things that didn't belong to him. He thought Tim was getting a little too over sentimental, all he had done was borrow Snowy for target practice, Tim could get a new cuddly toy dog... Unfortunately Tim didn't see it that way and when Bruce and Dick came in; they didn't either. He got three lectures that morning one from Dick, one from Alfred and the most painful one from his Father. Apparently the stuffed toy he had used for target practice had been given to Tim by his parents for his birthday, the last before they died. It meant the world to him... And Damian just destroyed it.

He was forced to apologise, as much as he didn't want to, by his father, and they parted, for school and work respectively, on sour terms. He just didn't understand the sentimental connection to an object.

Tim didn't talk to him on the way to their second floor classrooms, he didn't even acknowledge his presence, didn't even look at him. Even Dick and Jason glared at him before making their way to their own classes. He was used to Jason and Tim glaring at him... but Dick. He somehow felt sad as he looked his elder brother in the eyes, he couldn't explain it. He thought his brother would always smile at him no matter what he did; he thought he had Dick's personality sussed. But in that one tiny moment he realised he didn't, there was more to Dick than meets the eye. He didn't know how to explain it but he felt betrayed even though technically he was the betrayer. It was school's fault. School had made him soft... Made his mind weak, his feelings... Emotions more potent. He despised it, yet welcomed it at the same time... It had him befuddled. But before he could dwell on the subject any further he had to turn into his classroom where a grinning patronising Mrs Himnest Was standing waiting to pounce on them all unsuspectingly. Tim just kept walking. There wasn't his usual 'goodbye I'll see you at break' hug or hair ruffle, or even a smile. He didn't even look. As much as it pained him to admit it, he liked those. They were completely against everything he had been brought up with, a complete disregard for his higher blood standing, and to himself; but they were... nice. You never know what you have until it's gone. He bowed his head and walked into his classroom in a really glum mood.

* * *

He didn't want to just leave Damian standing there but he just couldn't bring himself to look at him at that moment, he was too angry. Tim had learnt at an early age that being angry never ended well so he was used to forgiving and forgetting, but not that morning. Snowy was too special to him. He loved The Adventures of Tin Tin and so; for his sixth birthday, his mum had brought him a Snowy cuddly toy... The last gift she had bought him before they died. He cherished that memory of her glowing face, smiling down at him just after he had ripped off the wrapping paper and he looked up at her stretching up his arms to give her a thank you hug. But the thought of his precious Snowy lying somewhere with knives or baterangs poking out of him was almost unbearable. So, he just looked forward and walked on to his classroom where Mr Gobnen was waiting to start his first lesson of the day; maths.

The most boring subject ever conceived. I mean how are they not supposed to know that one plus one equals two?... Well that was how easy it seemed to Tim. Today they were doing multiplication of double and triple digit numbers in about fifteen different ways. There was the multiplication grid. Chinese multiplication, long multiplication, short multiplication, augmented multiplication e.c.t or as he likes to call it... the most boring hour of his life. After the explanations as to how to multiply they were set a couple of questions to do using the many different methods. Tim finished in five minutes. Then a guy in his class, who he didn't know the name of... Actually due to the fact that he doesn't like socialising with his class mates and he spends most of his time hanging out with his brothers, and their misfit group of friends, he didn't know the names of many people in his class... He just never deemed it necessary to learn; he must remember to do that… started to talk to Mr Gobnen.

"Sir, why do we have to know how to do this like fifteen different ways" Mr Gobnen smiled a painful smile, he obviously agreed with the question but due to the fact that he was a teacher, he had to teach the syllabus, the entire syllabus.

"Because we are mathematicians and we like experimenting with maths" in any other situation he would have sounded profound, here, everyone just groaned. Tim returned to his finished page and decided that instead of asking for more work he was just going to stare out the window. It seemed like a great idea at the time. That was until he saw **him**. His heart skipped a beat and felt as though it had just jumped up into his throat. The pressed further up against the glass to get a better look. He saw the clown smiling as he walked into reception. That was when they heard the first gunshot. He panicked. His mind was racing as fast as his heart and suddenly he was six years old again.

* * *

_"Tim it's time for breakfast" his mother called up to him. In her usual chirpy manner._ _How she could be happy at a time like this he didn't know. He hadn't been happy in four weeks. Since his father's accident. He trudged downstairs to see his mum's smiling face. He gave her a quick forced smile and sat down at the kitchen table looking glum. Seeing his mood his mum walked up behind him and put her arms around his shoulders hugging tight. She waited and even tightened her hug until he relaxed into it. Then she smiling approached his ear and whispered into it;_

_"Daddy's home this afternoon and" she elongated the last word and moved herself directly above him. "I don't think daddy would want to see you looking so glum" she started tickling him. He tried to push her away at first, to no avail, then he just submitted to her and burst out laughing. She stopped. He kept smiling, he had forgotten today was the day his dad got home. "That's much better." She said looking at him from above, as he tilted his head back. She placed a bowl in front of him and told him to eat up or he would be late for school. So he did. He hated to admit it but he loved school, sneering that he was a scholarship student aside; it was fun, but admittedly not as challenging as he would like. He finished his breakfast and moved to get his bag and disappear out the door with his mum. "Tim please remember that Mr Wayne and his two sons are coming for dinner, he wants to see how you are getting on, so you need to be straight out of your classroom this afternoon, no hanging back" he turned and nodded an okay as he left the car, but as he walked down the path and into the school gate he couldn't help but wonder why the billionaire would care how he was getting on at school. Yes he was the recipient of the Wayne scholarship to Gotham High, but really, since when did that mean he had to come to dinner. His curiosity also struck, who were Bruce Wayne's sons? Well he knew who they were; the whole city knew who they were... Dick Grayson and Jason Todd. He also knew they went to his school, but he didn't really know who they were, and the fact that they were coming to his house for dinner meant that he had some right to know who they are... Right? _

_He decided to enact his plan at lunch. It wasn't really a plan as more of an 'I'm just going to follow them around' thing. After about fifteen minutes of searching he finally found them in the gymnastics room. What they were doing there he could not conceive, but he silently entered just to see. What he witnessed was nothing short of amazing. The elder boy; Dick was silently swinging from the rings, gathering momentum to do something, and the younger boy, Jason, was standing by the beam saying something to his brother that Tim thought was "you're never gonna make it" but he wasn't sure. Then it happened. Dick let go of the rings and flicked upwards completing a quadruple somersault before landing graciously on the beam. He didn't wobble once. Tim felt like clapping, but he didn't want them to know he was there so he stayed silent as he watched the elder boy flip down the beam and stick his landing perfectly. He looked down at his watch and realised that he only had ten minutes to get back and eat his lunch. He rushed off not caring about the loud racket of the door opening and closing and ran back to his classroom._

_The rest of the day passed as a boring blur, Tim was too excited about his dad coming home to care about what was being said; he knew it all anyway. When the bell rang at 3:15 he almost sprinted out of the classroom determined not to keep his mum waiting. She pulled up just as he reached the gate and he had already jumped in before she had had time to come fully to a stop. Before his mum could speak on the quizzical look she gave her son, he smiled sheepishly and just said._

_"I'm excited... Okay?" his mum looked at him and smiled back_

_"Of course darling, I'm excited too." He sighed and leaned his head back against the seat letting a smile crawl along his lips. His dad was coming home today; it was definitely the best day of his life in a long long time._

_"When's he getting home?" he had to ask as the hospital hadn't yet confirmed when his dad was being discharged when he had left for school_

_"We're going now"_

_"Now?" he almost squealed with excitement._

_"Yep, the hospital rang around noon" now he did squeal with excitement, his eyes wide and mouth smiling for the rest of the journey. _

_The hospital was large and white. It looked so clean, so empty, walking around brought back a lot of fear; a fear Tim hadn't felt in weeks. He walked a little closer to his mum hugging her arm tightly. Then when they rounded the corner to his dad's ward and they saw him he let go and ran. Jumping into his, which was a bit awkward seeing as how he was in a wheelchair, but Tim didn't mind, and obviously neither did his dad. His dad hugged him close and running his hand down the back of Tim's head stroking his hair and soothed into his ear_

_"Timmy, I've missed you so much"_

_"I've missed you too dad." he sat back onto his dad's lap, his dad drinking every detail of his face, his eyes, his smile. And then a grin broke out on his dad's face as well. The last time Tim had seen his dad he had just awoken from a coma and had told him that everything was going to be okay... But he wanted Tim to start school; be a regular kid, despite everything. He somehow believed that his accident meant Tim couldn't be a kid anymore, he thought he was robbing Tim of something, when all Tim really wanted to do was be with his dad. Two days later he was back in a coma, an infection they had said, they had had to transfer him out of Gotham General to a specialist clinic in another part of the country, to help him get better. Which he did, and now he's back. Paralysed from the waist down, but alive and back._

_"When can we leave? I have seen enough hospitals to last me a lifetime." his dad enquired to a nurse, adding the last part quietly into Tim's ear to make him giggle._

_"Just as soon as we have sorted out your release papers, Mr Drake. Which, all going well should be in about five minutes." the nurse took hold of the wheelchair's handles and started to push Tim and his dad out towards the reception area with his mum following closely behind. Fifteen minutes later they were ready to leave. Tim stayed with his dad as his mum got the car, hugging him tightly, feeling as though if he let go he would lose him. The car pulled up and he had to let go and climb into the back seat, with his parents in the front._

_"Honey, what's for dinner?" _

_"Roast chicken and vegetables" his dad's eyebrow lifted at the meal choice for a Tuesday night. "One; we need to celebrate the fact that you are home and two; Mr Wayne and his two boys are coming for dinner, and considering everything he has done for us I wanted to put on something special." His dad smiled a loving calm soft smile and said quietly_

_"And that is why I fell in love with you"_

_"My superior cooking skills?" he chuckled at his wife's comment_

_"Of course... And you're the fact that you are amazing, beautiful, caring and have an incredibly warm and kind heart" Tim looked away rolling his eyes as his parents kissed. His mum then started the car and they drove home with Tim recounting everything from the few weeks his dad had been gone, striving to miss anything out. His father laughed when needed and reached into the back to ruffle his son's hair when the story required him to. And just like that the journey was over, they were home. They were a family again. _

* * *

_His dad's first question when they entered the house was who fitted the stair lift? They dreaded the question that they knew would come, if his dad had one weakness, it was his pride. Tim had seen the glint of it in his eyes when he was told that Mr Wayne had decided to pay off his hospital bills. There was no way they could pay for them themselves, but his dad didn't want to admit that. He had graciously accepted the gift... He was a Wayne Enterprises employee after all; however Mr Wayne giving their home disabled access may be one step too far._

_"Mr Wayne did honey" Tim's mum said cautiously, seeing that her husband was in no fit state to argue she moved to end the conversation completely "and technically he had every right to... This is his building after all, if he wants to give it disabled access then he can with or without the tenants permission... It's all in the contract." she smiled and moved past the two of them; and into the kitchen to see if dinner was progressing correctly. His dad smiled, conceding defeat to their multibillionaire benefactor._

_"Well, I guess as my employer... It is his right." he wheeled himself onto the platform... And hit the button "and I might as well try it out" he sprouted a childish grin and Tim grinned back then left to go help his mum in the kitchen._

_An hour and a half later everything was ready... The table was set for seven, they had tried to make it as homely as possible, normally they didn't bother with setting the table, it was just grab a plate, cutlery, a glass of juice and sit down, say grace and start eating. But today they had guests so the table was set, vegetables, meat, gravy and potatoes were on the table along with a couple of cartons of juice and a jug of water. Tim was very proud of how it had come out. There was a knock at the door. They were here. Tim was a little apprehensive at opening the door, just in case Mr Wayne's sons had seen him watching them earlier. Technically he was in first grade and so he was not supposed to be in the other part of the school, unless he had older siblings, which he did not. Tim hated getting in trouble; his stomach flipped and ached and he felt like he might tear up every time his teacher criticised a piece of work, he didn't know what he'd do if someone full blown told him off. Tim was for all intents and purposes a perfectionist; and an obsessive perfectionist at that. _

_"Tim, will you get the door? It is rude to leave our guests waiting." his dad called from the dining room, with that he ran to the door and opened it standing right in front of him was Bruce Wayne, his two kids and their butler. He smiled sheepishly and muttered for them to come it, he didn't know what it was about the man but something about him made him want to run away and find refuge in his mother's arms, something about the notorious playboy scared him. They followed him when he walked into the kitchen. His parents greeted them, pleasantries were exchanged; small talk filled the air. He could feel their eyes on him; he didn't know what to say, how to respond to their well-meant but intimidating stare. He met their gaze._

_"Hi" he smiled the cute smile every six year old sport when faced with people they don't know._

"_Hi… Tim?" came the reply from the elder boy_

"_Yeah…" there was an awkward silence until the elder boy spoke out again, this time extending a hand_

"_I'm Richard John Grayson-Wayne, but everyone calls me Dick" he said smiling as Tim took the hand "and this grumpy pants is "Jason Peter Todd-Wayne" Jason looked angry at this _

"_Am not" he complained to his brother, slightly confused Tim piped up_

"_You're not called Jason" he asked innocently, seeing his befuddlement Jason smiled at the young child_

"_No I am called Jason, but I'm not grumpy, I'm just hungry" he emphasized the last part of the sentence, saying just that bit louder so his dad could hear. Bruce rolled his eyes and Dick gave his brother a hearty laugh, the adults, who had obviously heard their conversation, beckoned them all to sit down. Tim started off towards the table but diverted when he saw that Alfred wasn't moving to sit down as well._

"_Mr Pennyworth, are you all right?" the butler was a little startled when he heard the child saying 'Mr Pennyworth'_

"_Why of course young Mister Drake"_

"_Then why are you just standing here." _

"_I am only here as a butler to Master Wayne, I do not barge into his business"_

"_But Mr Pennyworth, we made enough for everyone, and I set the table for seven and everything… you have to sit down and eat with us." He made himself extra cute by putting on some puppy dog eyes, and lightly tugging at the man's trouser bottoms motioning for him to follow him to the dinner table, which he did after caving into the puppy dog eyes Tim gave him, and rolling his own._

_Once everyone was seated Jason immediately reached over to grab some food, only to have his leg kicked by Dick who turned to him and mouthed "Grace" flicking his eyes towards the Drakes as he did. He shied away from the food, obviously embarrassed and waited patiently as Tim's dad said grace. He was not however very patient when grace was over. Grabbing, and devouring any food passed his way; it was quite amusing really. _

_There was polite conversation during dinner, but Tim wasn't really paying attention, he was more interested in the boys sitting opposite him across the dinner table. They were dressed in smart-casual dark blue jeans and checked shirts. Their eyes, although both blue, were extremely different from each other. Tim had always been good at reading other people, through their body language, expressions, and eyes. Dick's were bright but sad; Tim could tell the deaths of his parents still affected him deeply, even though he tried to hide it. Jason's were another story, they were twinkling with anger and aggression, for reasons Tim didn't know. Both boys' eyes shone with love for their new family. Tim smiled both inwardly and outwardly, he liked it when people got along. _

_Dinner took longer than expected… then again Tim didn't think anyone factored in the time taken by conversing about anything and everything, apart from what Mr Wayne and his family came here to do. They saved this to when they all moved into the living room; which, although small, accommodated for everyone. _

"_So Timothy…" Mr Wayne said sitting down and crossing his legs. Tim blushed, no one called him Timothy. _

"_Tim" he whispered back. Mr Wayne smiled,_

"_Tim… how have you found your first few weeks at school?" Tim went even redder_

"_Well, um… it's been okay, I guess. The works been really easy; I mean I know everything they have tried to teach us. So I guess I've been pretty bored, and distracted... obviously." He looked like a six year old, walked like a six year old but he talked like someone much older, bar the nerves so intricately intertwined in his vocal chords, well actually most people got nervous when they spoke in front of someone they didn't know. "Miss Colden did ask me yesterday if she could set up a meeting with my parents to ask them about skipping grades; but mum and I decided that I didn't want to" This was entirely expected. Tim was after all a child prodigy; a genius… who had been, for most of his short life, a loner on the outskirts of society because he was different than every other kid. Bruce had given him the chance to experience life with those his own age, and he was taking full advantage of that; so, to Bruce at least, it was expected that he would give up the chance to skip grades so he could be a regular kid for once. Jason and Dick however just gaped at him_

"_You were told you could skip grades… and you declined… why?" Jason blurted out completely astounded by what had just been revealed. Tim blushed again. Blushing was something his was becoming quite an expert in._

"_Because I just want to fit in, being in a class full of people older than myself; isn't fitting in, it's standing out" his voice quietened dramatically and he looked towards the floor "I don't like standing out" Bruce glared at his son, it was defiantly not polite to embarrass someone in their own home, especially not a small and undeniably cute six year old. He decided to move on to stop Tim from having to suffer though any more of either one of his sons' antics. _

"_Yes I was informed of your decision, and even though you don't want to be moved up grades, Miss Colden still wants to stretch you in lessons, so, we have decided that we are going to give you a number of 'extension' exercises to do each week, either in lessons or at home." Tim's eyes brightened and a smile graced his lips. Bruce had to wonder what type of six-year-old smiled at the thought of extra work? And he couldn't help but smile back._

"_Thank-you Mr Wayne, I would like that a lot" was his only reply as his mum hugged him into her chest. _

"_Also, as part of the Wayne scholarship you, your parent's and I will need to have meeting about twice a semester, just to see how things are going, and make sure that you don't have any problems or anything like that." The family nodded. "Usually they are at Wayne Manor, but it was very kind of you to invite us into **your** home this evening. There is one more thing I think the boys want to add before we take up any more of your time…" he somehow handed an air of importance over to Dick… and everyone (even Jason) stared at him_

"_Well, we, Jason and I," he said motioning to the both of them "were thinking that, you know, um, seeing as you don't know anyone at school, and um, well we were wondering if you would like to hang out with us at break and lunch times." He started talking faster in a matter of fact way "Cause Jase can pick you up from your classroom and then you can sit with us, and we can introduce you to some people and um stuff" He smiled awkwardly down at the boy in front of him, expecting him to reject the offer, but instead he looked back at him with a huge grin on his face, nodding and saying_

"_Yes please" Dick couldn't help but grin back._

_The Waynes took their leave after that, Tim guessed they were very busy people, and anyway he wanted to spend time with his dad. Who was grinning at him with the most childish grin Tim had ever seen._

"_Your mother and I were wondering, as, seeing as today is a special occasion, you would be awake enough to go round that new science exhibition on fifth and second?" Tim returned the childish grin. _

* * *

_The exhibition had been amazing. For all the complicated experiments he was shown Tim still loved the plasma ball, it was just so fun. There was also an interactive centre where they had spent most of their time. It had EVERYHING… a gigantic Newton's cradle; a vortex creator (where you spun round a fan at the bottom of a cylinder of water to create a vortex in the water); an air cannon (which was far too much fun); some tubes containing different densities of liquids, and rods to push into them; and Tim's favourite: a giant leaf blower that could hover a beach ball… he needed to find out how that worked, especially as if you put your hand behind the ball and move towards it the ball moved away from your hand… Tim found it quite amazing._

_He was getting tired; it was half past eight and past his bed time. His parents saw him yawing and took the hint. Collecting him in his arm's Jack Drake let his tired son sit on his lap and hugged him tight as he let his wife wheel them towards the car. That was when he saw them. It was a brief moment, but a brief moment was all he needed. They were like three shadows moving along the rooftops, silent, deadly, but graceful and almost majestic. In that brief moment he saw something that he will never forget. The taller boy… Nightwing they called him ran along a rooftop, got to the edge, launched himself into the air, did a quadruple somersault and landed perfectly on a nearby street lamp before jumping down and disappearing into an alleyway next to the exhibition centre. That was when it hit him. He had seen that before, that very same day… Dick. And if Dick was Nightwing then Batman must be… Bruce Wayne and Robin must be Jason Todd. It fitted perfectly; he had the money, the means; although his personality was off for the Batman, but Tim guessed that was just a guise, a mask so that no one would figure it out. Suddenly he felt guilty. He shouldn't know who they are, he felt like he was betraying them and their protection of his city just by figuring it out. Then again it's not like he was going to tell anybody, and who would believe him if he did? Bruce Wayne? Batman? The thought didn't even cross anyone's minds. He hugged his Dad closer; full of worry about the burden he just forced upon himself. That worry turned slowly to dreams of Batman, Robin and Nightwing as he fell asleep in his father's arms._

* * *

_He woke with a start. He was in his room, it was dark, and he was… sweating? Why? What was that sound? Something had woken him and he wanted to know what. His mind raced as he creped to his door. A light was on in the hallway, someone was talking in a voice he didn't recognise. He opened his door a crack to see a figure disappear into his parents' bedroom. He shuffled out, making not noise and moved to his parents' room. The door had been left open he approached cautiously before he reached the door he stopped suddenly, frozen in fear. His feet wouldn't respond he wanted to move closer but his instinct told him to run away. The sound that came from his parent's bedroom was terrifying, maniacal laughter radiated off the walls all around. It was uncontrolled, unbridled. Totally psychotic. He had returned to talking but Tim couldn't understand what he was saying his brain wouldn't work. He inched closer and closer to the open doorway and peaked round. The man was dressed in a purple pinstriped suit. It was garish. One thing was certain he had no dress sense… and now his primate instinct to make a stressful situation funny was taking over. Great. He looked back at the man who had his back to the doorway. His hair was green… green that could only mean one thing; it could only be one person. No… no it couldn't be… other people could dress in a purple pinstriped suit and have green hair… right? His breath was caught somewhere in his throat. He wanted to run away but something prevented him from taking his eyes off the man who was threatening his parents. The he heard the first shot. His mother screamed he saw blood dripping down his father's leg and start pooling on the floor. He was gone. In a single instant Tim's world collapsed. Tears trickled down his cheeks his hear skipped a beat then started hammering against his ribcage. He was gone. This couldn't be happening he had only just come back… why was this happening? His mum was still screaming. The man was laughing at her anguish; her clutching her husband's unmoving, lifeless… dead body. The words were so final. Dead. The world seemed to slow into a painful silence as a second shot rang out into the night. He had got bored of his mum's screaming and crying and shot her too. His tears doubled; his face ashen, he started hyperventilating. They were both gone. His life was over. He would never see their happy smile's again, feel their warm embraces; fall asleep on their laps, in their arms. He moved away from the door running silently back to his room. He didn't know what to do. He decided to hide until the man left, give in to his animal instincts of flight or fight? Flight. He closed his door. The sound range out like a gunshot. He was dead, he knew it. The man would have heard; he would know here was here… he had seen. He found his favourite hiding place and waited. Waited for the tell tail click of his door handle…waited to see his parent's again. To stop crying. To stop feeling an empty pain it his chest. It all happened in a flash, the click of the door the man's less than silent footsteps. He could feel the hand lift up the lid of the bock, see the man's evil eyes as he regarded the boy hiding the box with a confused yet amused expression he threw the lid off and stepped back laughing. Tim climbed out of the box hoping somehow to get away. He was afraid of dying, as much as he wanted to see his parents again… he didn't want to die. The man was shouting something at him like_

"_Aww come on… I just want to play. Don't you want to play with your uncle Joker?" the man's smile broadened as he cornered Tim who turned around, to face his demise proudly… like his father. "You know kid… you're boring. I don't like boring people." He sounded like a demented five year old. He was twirling the gun round his finger as he stood boxing Tim in. "Your parents were bring too" anger flashed in Tim's eyes but he was powerless to do anything about it. His eyes set the Joker laughing again. He had started tearing and he melodramatically wiped them from his cheek. "so you do have some flare then kid" there was a loud crash… smashing glass, and the Joker's filled with fear. He looked at Tim then at the window. "Sorry kid" it wasn't an apology… more of a sick minded joke on his part "Say hi to mummy and daddy for me will you?" and Tim was on the floor… something warm was soaking his pyjamas. Another smash marked the Joker's exit from their house… his house. _

"_Tim… Tim" someone was shouting for him, the voice was desperate; like he was afraid of what he would find it he didn't get an answer. _

"_Oh no… TIM" the voice shouted. He felt someone approach. Then pain filled his entire being. A hand had put pressure on the wound. Stop the bleeding… that's what he was trying to do… stop the bleeding. Another hand cradled his head forcing him to look at the man… boy. Nightwing… Dick. "C'mon Tim open your eyes… stay with me buddy" he felt two more presences enter his room. He opened his eyes more than the squint they had been previously._

"_D-Dick?" he saw the boy share a look with Batman he tried to smile. Moving hurt._

"_How'd you figure that one buddy?"_

"_I saw your quadruple somersault… sorry" he added he didn't want them angry with him… to just leave him here to die alone. _

"_Nothing to be sorry for…" he smiled at Tim "you really are a genius" Tim felt his eyes closing "Tim… Tim stay with me. You are _**_no__t_**_ going to die on me" he tried desperately to open his eyes… for Dick; but he couldn't. "C'mon Tim, we still have to introduce you to all our friends at school…" he continued talking to Tim keeping him just awake as someone lifted him. He screamed in pain and felt himself blacking out he felt someone squeezing his hand and not letting go. He let the painless darkness take him; smother him into a blissful sleep._

* * *

A small tear crept down his cheek. The memories are just as painful now as they were then. He looked around and noticed that a few people were crying, one was hyperventilating another periodically screamed. He was blank. He wore his Red Robin face; indifference shining through. A door slammed, followed by a bang and another scream. It came from Damian's classroom. Why would the Joker go to Damian's classroom? From the entrance the Joker took there were three classrooms before his, all were occupied. Why Damian's unless… the realisation washed over him like a bucket of ice cold water sending shivers down his spine. He felt his body move before he had made the conscious decision for it to do so; history was not going to repeat itself, he would make sure of it.

Somewhere in the back of his mind he heard Mr Gobnen call for him to come back. He dismissed it and carried on. Now he was running down the corridor the door leading into Damian's classroom. He took a deep breath; it was open, just like last time. He slowly manoeuvred himself into a position to see into the classroom without himself being seen. The Joker had a gun on his brother. Anger boiled up inside of him. The Joker was going to kill his brother… his brother who currently thought he hated him. Why had he not said goodbye? Ruffled his hair? Told him that even though he did destroy his favourite stuffed animal he still loved him?… because he was angry. Anger never gets you anywhere.

The room was silent; apart from **him**. The Joker was throwing insults at the helpless, well almost helpless, little six year old, then he laughed… just laughed. Petty. The Joker was just a petty piece of rubbish who; somehow, found pleasure in terrifying six year olds… it made Tim sick to watch. As he laughed the gun was slack in his hand… **less** harmless than if it was taut and aimed, a lot of emphasis on the less. The Joker would never ever ever be harmless, not in a million years. Make that a couple billion. He suddenly stopped. Echoes of his disturbed laughing bounced off the inside of Tim's head; it gave Tim the same feeling as being stuck in a room listening to Friday by Rebecca Black non-stop for five hours. After a twitch of movement and he regained focus. His eyes narrowed.

* * *

Damian was bored out of his mind. Why was it that every villain had to **talk** so much? Would it kill them to shut up for once in a while… some of them could beat Grayson in 'The Universe's Most Chatty Person' competition; and that was saying something. Then again the Joker was the worst… or so he had been told. All the villains he had met so far had spent their words laying out their plans; most of them totally and utterly stupid, but what else would you get on a routine patrol? The Joker however just talked about pointless nothingness; priming his victims into a petrified state of fear at what he was going to do next. Damian had met no one like him yet, he felt unprepared from his patrols with father… nothing fun and challenging ever happened. For him; a six year old assassin who was a better fighter than any of them… save father; fun was chasing around enemies that liked shadows… or sword fighting… or practicing his martial arts skills on unknowing muggers… or plain punching people… or beating them at pointless mind games. The Joker bursting into his classroom and shooting guns that's bullets were in fact flags with the word 'Bang' on it; the Joker had laughed but Damian hadn't got the joke… this was not his definition of fun. In fact, somewhere deep, deep inside him; he was scared. He had read the villain's file; a psychotic lunatic in every sense of the words… he belonged at Arkham for the rest of his life… the shorter life the better. The Joker threw down the fake gun and picked up a revolver out of his coat pocket as his eyes fixed on Damian. Recognition flowed from them spreading to the rest of his face, submitting them to long arduous seconds of watching his face contort into a broad menacing grin that belonged in a House of Horrors.

"My, my, what do we have here? Mini Wayne? Aww, you're so cute I just want to torture you death." Damian growled and glared. HE WAS NOT CUTE!

"Hmmm, what should we do with you? Throw you in a vat of chemical waste?... nah it's been done. Beat you to death with a crow bar?... no, I'm saving that for a certain little birdy. I could blow you up… but that's just boring… oh oh… I could Jokerize you. Would you like that? You could be my Robin… of course you would need a costume… but we could run around together causing havoc and mayhem… you'd like that wouldn't you? Of course you would every six year old would…" Enough. He had had enough of listening to this maniac debate with himself.

"Why on Earth would I choose to be a freak like you?" Damian retorted; meaning every bit of the spite that was in his voice. The Joker looked at him in stunned silence. Before his face crumpled in anger, mouth still open wide. He spluttered a bit before his arms went up in the air. He was flailing his gun around wildly, shouting insults at him… at his father's name… at his family. Telling him how he was a good for nothing little brat. How he had just been offered a once in a lifetime opportunity. How he wasn't a freak. Damian was bored again; then he saw his brother out of the corner of his eye, lurking in the shadows of the doorway, meticulously watching every move the Joker made. Something told Damian that Drake had seen this scene before… it was probably the anger swelling in Drake's eyes. Even more anger than he had seen that morning. Drake must really hate the Joker. The Joker had started laughing; at what Damian hadn't caught… he wasn't paying much attention to the idiot standing in front of him until he stopped laughing and twitched his gun back into position right in front of his heart. He hadn't even noticed Drake move… he was better than Damian believed him to be. But sure enough a blink of an eye later Drake was standing in front of him; shielding him from the revolver currently pointing at him.

"Drake I could have-" he started whispering but was cut off.

"No you couldn't… you probably could have when he wasn't pointing his gun at you, when his defences were temporarily down. But now… even you can't out run a speeding bullet." His voice was low… only Damian would have heard it. Damian looked down at the floor to process the logical information just imparted on him… Drake was right with a gun pointed at him there was nothing he could do… he was a helpless six year old. Then it struck him.

"You can't either"

"No; I can't" was the only reply he got and it sent ice down Damian spine. He hadn't even sincerely apologised for destroying Snowy. He just wanted something animal like to practice on… that wasn't alive and Snowy was the only thing he could find. He wouldn't have taken it if he knew it was going to upset Drake so much. He thought Drake hated him, and now he was going to take a bull- no, no he wasn't they were going to be fine. they were Robin and Red Robin, son's and partners of The Batman... they would figure something out. He would get to apologise later and everything was going to be okay. He couldn't seem to be able to banish the thoughts rom his head to he turned his attention back to the Joker who was still eyeing up Drake with a confused curiosity which suddenly brightened up into wide eyed recognition for the second time that day.

"KID! How've you been? Long-time no shoot. How are mummy and daddy? Still dead?" he hooted in laughter. Drake's eyes narrowed in anger and he started to shake "I came here for the good for nothing brat behind you but I guess you will do." His gun fired and Drake crumpled.

He felt a shout leave his lips but he didn't know quite what he had said… or whether it just came out as a kind of strangled cat sound. He didn't understand why Drake; who currently hated him for killing Snowy would have done that, he wasn't even related to him… he had no blood ties… was not bound by family honour. Or was he? Suddenly the realisation came over Damian, everything he had been taught was wrong. He knelt in stunned silence and; as he stared at the blood pooling in front of him, he realised, for the first time in his life; blood was in fact not thicker than water.

* * *

It was different than last time. The pain was overwhelming. A better placed bullet, skipping the shock stage and going straight to the bleeding out. He heard a sound much like a strangled cat above him mixed with that stupid psychotic laughter. It was hard to breath, and breathing hurt. He tried to take a deep breath, to stop his hyperventilation, it sounded like he was gargling water and the pain in his chest was almost unbearable; his reaction was to cough. It came out red leaving a metal after taste in his mouth. The bullet had punctured a lung. Great. He felt a small hand put pressure on the wound… it wasn't going to make any difference. He had been shot before, and they had been bad enough. But this time the bullet was in the right place and there were no layers of Kevlar titanium alloy tunic to help him. This was really it. He wasn't going to make it out of this one. The realization sunk in and made his stomach drop with a weird sensation of butterflies. He had been on borrowed time anyway, the Joker's last bullet should have killed him; it was a miracle it didn't, but there was no Dark Knight in shining armour to save him this time. He only wished he had got the chance to say goodbye to everybody. He smiled as he remembered their smiling laughing faces as the memories of his life passed before his eyes… he wanted to remember the good times; his birthdays… his old family… his new family… Robin… Red Robin… even some days at school.

"Damian… I love you… tell everyone else I… love them to" it was all he could manage as he winced in pain. His voice was quiet breathy, not himself, but Damian heard him and he was sure he had heard a small whimper of;

"Tell them yourself… Tim" he smiled at the use of his first name. He felt the familiar cold darkness of unconsciousness draw itself over him as his eyes closed. It wasn't long now. He had to admit he didn't want to go, he loved his life, he loved Bruce, Dick, Jason, Alfred and even Damian but a part of him had been longing to die ever since first grade. He just wanted to see his parents again… not long now Mum, Dad. Not long no-


	8. 42: What have you done with our Damian?

**Hey; next chapter is here... and no I couldn't kill him. It would take the characters to a place I didn't want them to go so...**

**Also I was going to post this yesterday... but due to the circumstances on the news it kinda didn't feel right, please forgive me for that. And please remember to pray for the victims and their families because it was a senseless display of violence that has ruined too many lives.  
**

**As always please read and review... or just leave a comment to cheer me up as I am now in a bad mood because of what happened in the States yesterday (I always am when something like this happens... my little brain doesn't like it when actions cannot be explained... and these can never be explained)**

**Thanks Supernova95... Enjoy :)**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Batman or any Batman related characters... they belong to DC Entertainment.**

* * *

He was breathing. Yes it was small shallow and laboured… but he was breathing. Unconscious but breathing… that was the main thing. Breathing and pulse. Compress the wound; reduce blood loss. Check he was still breathing. The thoughts ran through his head as he followed them step by step again and again and again and again. Throughout it all; The Joker just laughed… didn't this guy ever get fed up of that. Surely his vocal cords were damaged beyond all repair from all this high pitched squealing laughter. Then again his voice was also high pitched and nails on chalkboard like; it probably couldn't do any more damage.

"Aww how cute... Mini Wayne is all concerned about Kid." Tim. The Joker hadn't even bothered to find out his name... especially as they had a history... Who shoots someone without even knowing who they were shooting? There is no honour among barbaric, psychotic, evil megalomaniacs.

Damian saw red. He lashed out, the calm demeanour of a trained assassin smashed into a thousand pieces by a single gunshot. He attacked in anger, trying to kill but in his distracting rage could do no more than the average six-year-old. And the Joker just laughed. He just stood there laughing his head off like this was the funniest thing in the world, his high pitched squealing laugh the only thing breaking the silence of the room as he held a struggling Damian by the scruff of the neck, hoisting him off his feet.

"I came here to kill you today, Mini Wayne" he said between cackles flicking his revolver around like it was some toy "but now I don't feel like it" he laughed again. Damian's eyes narrowed.

"You'll pay for this..." he said using his best bat voice he could muster.

"I will, will I? What are you going to do? Scratch me to death." laughing the Joker threw Damian away as though he was nothing. The sound of sirens broke into the room. "Oopsie, sounds like that's my cue to leave. Give my regards to Kid" he glanced down at the bloody unconscious boy crumpled on the floor and grinned "... At his funeral" his grin turned into hooting laughter as he skipped down the hall and back the way he came. Damian returned to Dra- Tim. Breathing and pulse. Compress the wound; reduce blood loss. Check he was still breathing. His chest didn't rise, there was no air exhaled or inhaled... He tentatively checked his neck for a pulse. It was there. Faint but there.

"Come off it Drake. You are not dying on me. No after-" you taught me to be a brother. He didn't quite know what to do. He needed adrenaline... But didn't have any for obvious reasons; so Tim's body would just have to make its own... How to do that? Pain. His body would respond to a physical threat and release adrenaline... If he had any left.

"Sorry T...Tim" he whispered to his brother quietly as he raised his hand above his head and clenched it in a fist. As he brought his hand down he found that he was glad his class was still in shock so none of them tried to stop him. The result was almost instantaneous, his hand made contact with the wound; physical threat... Tim's eyes shot open. He tried to gasp but couldn't. Instead his eyes regained a glint of focus... of intent to breath; short, shallow… controlled. It was then Damian realised what he was doing. He was trying to put himself into a meditative state to reduce the blood loss or at least make sure his heart didn't shut down because of it. When he got home he would make sure his father taught him how to do that too.

* * *

The paramedics appeared shortly after. Carrying with them syringes of life saving drugs, oxygen masks, a bed to carry Tim down to the ambience in and... Antiseptic wipes? Once Tim had been removed from the room and sent on his way to the hospital he was given a few by one of the remaining paramedics;

"Blood can be real difficult to get off" was the only explanation he received. It amazed him to think that just a few hours ago he would have been that guy... The guy that didn't really care about whose blood they were talking about. It was just a job, routine. Especially in Gotham.

"Is... Is he going to be okay" the man looked down at him,

"It's too early to say, he's lost a lot of blood, he has a punctured lung and his body has gone into some catatonic state that is like a coma, but not a coma. Is he a friend? I'm sure if you ask his parents they'll keep you infor-" Damian cut him off by shaking his head.

"He's my brother" the paramedic's eyes were suddenly full of care and compassion.

"Yeah kid; we think he is." he looked at Damian's bloody hands and got down on one knee "apparently that's thanks to you." Damian felt a hand ruffle his hair then the man picked him up and started to carry him outside. It was then he realised just how weak he actually was. As much as he hated being carried he couldn't resist the paramedic, he was too tired, all he could do was let himself hang there in the man's strong arms; his eyes perilously close to closing and sending him to sleep. That was until a worried shout came from the school gates.

"Damian!" it was Dick. He felt himself be put down on a step and something draped around his shoulders. Refusing to look up at the moment he stared intently at the floor. He would not let his brothers see him this full of emotion. He was the assassin kid, the boy trained from birth to kill and not care who he killed but something inside him had broken; snapped and he didn't think there was any way of getting it back.

"Dami?" Dick again, but now he was right above him...he heard a rustle, felt a displacement in the air around him... Dick had crouched and was now right in front of him.

"Dami" his voice was soft, full of worry. "Are you hurt?... Please tell me he didn't hurt you." he slowly shook his head and Dick took a breath and let it out as a sigh of relief; until Damian looked up. Damian could tell his eyes were tearing since the Joker shot Tim. Now the flood gates opened and he buried himself in his brother's shoulder. Dick stiffened, he was not use to this show of emotions from anyone it their family, let alone Damian, not wanting to waste the opportunity to touch his brother, let alone hug him, Dick pulled Damian close, and wrapped his arms around him in a tight hug.

"Hey Dami… It's okay, it's okay, everything's going to be fine…" that made Damian sob harder. Worried Dick pulled Damian away from his shoulder and weaved his head like a snake trying to make eye contact.

"Damian; what's wrong?" his voice was stern yet soft… demanding an answer, but not in a mean way.

"He… he was saving me…"

"Wait… who was saving you?… Damian what are you talking about?" they hadn't told him… why hadn't they told him? Damian searched around wildly for his father… not here yet. Of course they wouldn't tell the siblings… just the parents, rules sucked sometimes.

"T…Tim" it was all he could manage. Dick's brow creased and he looked around behind him.

"What about him Dami?" Dami broke into more tears.

"He… he saved me… he…he" he couldn't suppress his sobs any more, and he buried himself into Dicks already soaked shoulder. Dick's head searched around again until his mouth was right beside Damian's ear.

"Damian; where is Tim?" his whisper was full of concern and Damian didn't feel as though he could answer it.

"They t…took him t…to the hos…hospital" He could feel Dick's eyes widening

"Why?" there was a tone of dread in his voice, like he already knew the answer but didn't want to voice it. Damian bucked up some courage

"The Joker… shot him." By the end of his sentence Damian already felt hot drops of tears on the back of his neck as Dick pulled him closer and hugged him tighter. They sat there for what seemed like forever, Dick just hugging him, as though that would make everything alright. They knew he was there, he had trained them after all, they also knew he didn't want to disturb them, but there was only so much hugging from Dick that Damian could take. He pushed away from Dick silently thanking him with a sheepish smile, and ran to his father, who scooped him up in his arms and held him there rocking him slowly. Dick smiled at how fatherly Bruce could be when confronted by a crying six year old assassin; the sight reminded him of how many times he had seen Bruce do this with Tim. His face fell. Bruce must have seen because he started to look worried also.

"Dick; what is it?"

"Tim… he's-"

"Mr Wayne" Dick was cut off by the Principle who was purposefully walking up to Bruce with Jason following shortly behind, but joining Dick when he saw him. They stood throughout the principal's explanation of what had happened the lesson prior. It was sketchy at best; Damian's classmates were obviously still in shock. Damian wasn't doing too much better himself; now asleep in his father's arms. That was probably a good thing as the Principal's recount would have probably just set him off crying again. Bruce's face drained in colour.

"Which?-"

"Gotham General" the principal replied to the unasked question.

"How long?-"

"The ambulance left ten minutes ago" Ten minutes? Was that all the time that had passed?… it seemed like an eternity. Bruce nodded and set a very fast pace back to Alfred and the car; with Dick and Jason in hot pursuit, the car started moving barely after the door closed.

* * *

They sat in silence. There weren't really any words to say; Tim had been shot by the Joker… again. The man… the monster had it out for him. Anger boiled up in Dick, he remembered the last time, Tim's frail body, covered head to toe in blood. His pale face, shallow breaths, the look of horror still etched on his face. It was touch and go at first whether or not he was going to survive; but that was a badly placed shot: minimal damage. This was different he could feel it. The Joker had intended to kill him dead; Dick worried that this time he had succeeded. He saw that worry on everyone's faces… even Damian's who was cradled in Bruce's lap; he was probably having a nightmare, but was just too tired to wake up. Bruce was stroking his hair, reassuring him that he was alright, that nothing was going to hurt him while he was there; as he did so many times with all of them when they had nightmares. The hospital was three minutes away… three minutes have never taken so long. Alfred didn't bother to park; he just drove up to the main doors, let them out and drove off to find a parking space without a car full of worried bats… just a worried to death butler.

When they strode in nobody questioned them, **everyone** recognised Bruce, and he didn't even need to open his mouth before the receptionist said;

"He's still in surgery Mr Wayne… he probably will be for a while, you can wait outside theatre four, until he comes out"

"Thank-you" the emotional sincerity in his voice scared Dick and Jason. He was only like this when he was worried… really worried. Bruce started off again with Damian on his shoulder and the two other boys in tow, they shouldn't have been surprised that Bruce knew his way around the hospital like the back of his hand… it was where his father practiced after all, and he was Batman of course… but they always were. A hospital just wasn't where they would think of him… the almighty, indestructible Batman; to know about… the criminal underworld of Gotham yes… Gotham General no.

Waiting outside the theatre was just as bad as waiting anywhere else. All they wanted was to know what was happening a few feet away; but they couldn't.

Damian woke up after a while, and quickly snuggled back up to his dad; his cuteness was truly amusing, at least it was as he was a self-proclaimed cold blooded killer. Now, for some reason, Dick thought that Damian would blanch at killing, especially with a gun, not that he used guns… no he preferred swords, 'it's more intimate that way' he had told them, but that was a different Damian.

He opened his eyes blearily; and pushed himself up, only to be faced with a wall of cold… so he quickly snuggled up to the warm body beneath him slowly stroking his hair. Usually he would protest, but he wasn't in the mood. He looked up at his father; his sad eyes looked down at Damian.

"Daddy…" a slip of the tongue… it must have been "Father…" no it didn't sound right "Daddy" much better, he smiled "is Tim going to be okay?" His dad opened his mouth to answer "And please tell me the truth, I am not in the mood to be lied to."

Damian, and Tim for that matter, could always tell when Bruce was lying to them; Dick put it down to them growing up with him from a younger age, although Damian had only been with them a few short months.

Bruce looked down at his son with sad eyes; he couldn't lie to him, not now.

"I don't know Damian… I just don't know." Damian was satisfied with that answer, as painful as it was, he was satisfied and snuggled deeper into his lap probably trying to get to sleep again.

Jason nudged his brother with his elbow.

"What" Dick whispered back.

"Damian just called Tim: Tim." It was true; Dick hadn't noticed it until Jason said so but it was true. Damian never; **never** called Tim: Tim, it was always 'Drake'. Then his eyes widened;

"He also called dad; daddy… twice… and smiled about it" it was completely out of character for him, it was always surnames… or father. He just didn't at like this.

"You don't think he's been kidnapped by evil monkeys and replaced by a cuter nicer Damian do you? Or, or abducted by aliens and brainwashed? Or-"

"I can still hear you Tod… Jason" Damian said from Bruce's lap, and Bruce chuckled; Jason looked as though he was going to faint, but instead a grin spread across his face.

"Gotcha Babybird"

* * *

It was early evening when a doctor finally came out of the operating theatre. Everyone stood up and held their breath.

"He's alive." That breath was let out as a collected sigh of relief "But he's not out of the woods yet." Someone squeaked a panicked squeak… no one owned up "he 'died' three times during surgery" Dick wanted to cry "and he may still need some more blood, our stocks are dangerously low-"

"Take mine… I can donate to him, we're both universal donors" The doctor gave him a quizzical look "I gave him blood the last time he was shot" Dick explained, they were dangerously low on blood the last time Tim was shot. The hospital was always dangerously low on blood, let's face it; it's Gotham. The doctor looked to Bruce, Dick was underage, he wasn't supposed to donate blood but Bruce wasn't the right blood type to give blood to Tim and desperate times called for desperate measures. When Bruce nodded the doctor took Dick into another room. He came back with a bag of blood and a slightly woozy Dick. "Although the blood will help his cause we still want to keep him under observation for forty-eight hours in the ICU, he makes it though that and he will have a strong chance of making it through relatively unscathed." Bruce nodded

"Can we see him?" Damian piped up.

"For the next forty-eight hours… no, not to sit at his bedside at least; you can however see him through the windows at intensive care." Bruce nodded again

"Thank-you so much, for everything Doctor Hayman, please call me immediately if anything changes. For the better or worse" The Doctor nodded, smiled and clasped hands with the CEO, taking the business card in his outstretched hand, and ruffing the hair of the kids before disappearing back into the operating theatre, to bring Tim out.

When he returned time seemed to slow. The bed passed in slow motion and they all saw a frighteningly small, frail and ghostly white Timothy Drake-Wayne being scooted off into the distance. The only solace they received was the small rise and fall of his chest as he passed.

"Daddy" Damian was tugging frantically at his jacket bottom. "Can we go home please? I don't want to see him like this, it scares me." His voice was small, meaningful.

"Of course, kiddo" Damian flinched, Bruce didn't quite know why. "Alfred" the old and grey man looked at his charge with caring eyes "Please bring the car round"

"Of course sir." And he disappeared with Bruce and the boys following slowly behind, taking a detour past intensive care to check on Tim before heading to the main doors to be picked up by Alfred.

* * *

With everyone at home, it was surprising how quiet the manor was during the two days that followed. Bruce either spent is time busying himself in the Batcave or at the hospital staring at Tim though the pane of glass. Dick and Jason tried and tried to lighten each other's moods to no avail… they either ended up crying into each other or shouting at each other, and therefore, to preserve each other's sanity they separated themselves. Damian however refused to come out of his room for anything but bathroom breaks and meal time. He wouldn't tell anyone what he was doing, but whatever it was they knew it was a coping method. Hopefully it was working.

It was three days later when they got the call. The call telling them that Tim had been moved out of the ICU and they could see him now. He wasn't awake, but nothing had changed for the worst during his time in intensive care, so they thought he now had a large enough chance of survival that they could move him, and let him have visitors. This was a very good sign as Bruce said the 'coma that's not a coma' Tim currently found himself in was in fact a meditation technique Bruce showed him after he was shot the last time, just in case it happened again. Tim had to be talked out of it by familiar voices… their voices. It was a cliché, but if that's what worked; that's what worked.

"Damian" Bruce said as they walked out of the door to the car "Don't you think you should bring that project you have been working on for the past three days?" Damian grinned and nodded as he ran back inside. Dick and Jason stared at each other in shock. They had been trying to find out what Damian was working on for the past three days… they had actually been in the manor for that three days not hibernating in the Batcave as Bruce had done, to no avail… but he somehow knew… how did he know? Bruce smiled as his eyes flicked between the two shocked teens;

"Heh…" he smiled, chuckling slightly "…I'm Batman" he said simply as he walked towards Alfred who was waiting patiently by the car. Damian appeared later with something wrapped in a plastic bag **(1) **and ran after his father, between the two bemused boys who merely shrugged and ran after him.

"So Damian; what's in the bag?" Jason said as the car drove off, trying to break the tension.

"Nothing that concerns you; Jason." Came the reply with a smirk.

"Oh come on Dami, we've been dying to know…" Dick tried his luck. Wrong choice of words as Damian closed off completely and looked down at the bag in his hands. Realising his mistake Dick quickly corrected himself

"Dami… I didn't mean it like that… all I meant was that… we just really want to know what's in the bag." Nothing. Damian just sat there in silence, looking at the bag. Bruce shot him an 'apologise now' raise of the eyebrows which he did. He even scooted over to Damian and wrapped him up in a hug… still nothing. It ruined the 'we are all **going** to be cheerful no matter what' sentiment they had agreed on. Especially as they pulled into the hospital car-park.

* * *

Tim had been moved to the children's ward… to room 17p, a private room. They all sat with him for a while, just talking about anything and everything. Like how the Joker was now back in Arkham after having the snot beaten out of him by Batman, Nightwing, Red Hood and Robin. Like how they haven't been back at school yet as everyone is trying to pick up the pieces of what happened… and they're installing better security. Like how Dick gave him blood again… making the Blood Brother's joke **again**. Like how they **all** love him dearly and want him to wake up. That's when Alfred coughs and Bruce looks at him for a moment, they have a silent conversation. It's normal for them and you get used to it very quickly… but that still didn't mean that they didn't want to know what was being said.

"Dick, Jason… Alfred and I were wondering if you wanted to go down to the hospital shop and pick out a magazine each to read; Alfred and I want to get some coffee anyway."

"But what about Damia-" Dick was silenced by a glare. Then his eyes glanced at the bag Damian was holding and Dick got the picture.

"Of course we'd love to" he replied tugging Jason towards the door

"We would?" Jason asked as he let himself be dragged along

"Yes we would." It was a definitive to their verbal conversation, but not their questioning glances. They stopped just outside the door with Alfred to watch Bruce for a couple more moments. He looked down at his youngest and smiled; Damian looked back up at him, returned the smile and nodded a thank-you. Then Bruce turned to leave and Dick and Jason scooted away from the door, to pretend that they hadn't been watching. Bruce just looked at them and rolled his eyes. They walked to the elevator Alfred was holding, once inside their questions were **not** going to be ignored.

"So…?" Dick prompted, Bruce looked at him, and silently gave in.

"Damian's been fixing Snowy… I just thought he should be able to talk to Tim without us intruding on him." Dick's face crumpled as though he had just seen the cutest thing in the world.

"That's… That's… so… CUTE" the elevator's occupants rolled their eyes. "Et tu Alfred?"

"Sorry Master Richard, but sometimes your actions call for such methods" Bruce let out a chuckle and passed Dick a 'you should have known that was coming' glance and Dick gracefully smiled and let the comment, and glace, pass straight over his head.

* * *

_His world was spinning, nothing stood still, and it was making him feel sick. Then everything went black. Blacker than black. An all-encompassing night that swallowed him up into the cold unknown. He didn't like it, he didn't like it one bit. He had never felt so alone before, never been more afraid. Then the world seared white, he felt something, something he couldn't quite place; he thought it should hurt, but it didn't. Perhaps he was just too numb, too cold, too closed off from reality to feel anything. He remembered something… a reflex perhaps; an important reflex… in, out, in, out… focus on it, make it happen, find your centre. Let it swallow you up; let it control that all important reflex… survive. Surviving wasn't hard before, so why was it now? Did he not want to survive? Why wouldn't he want to survive? The darkness swept over him again, but this time it wasn't imposing or cold. It was welcoming, safe, calm. It took over those functions that he couldn't control… but needed to. Time didn't pass here… or maybe it did and he just didn't notice. Like time flies when you're having fun; this wasn't fun was it? Fun; what was fun? What was anything?… he tried to remember and was confronted by a series of painful flashes:_

_Someone was holding him, with a smile on herface. _

_The woman was sitting on a bench; waving with that smile still on her face. A man was pushing him on a swing… at least he thought it was a swing. He felt free._

_A shadow encompassed the room; he was tall, featureless, laughing. Two shots rang out and a large thump followed. He felt something drip on him. It was warm, thick… red. He was panicking… the substance kept flowing… crawling further and further up his body until he started drowning in it. The shadow loomed over him, he couldn't breathe. It engulfed him smothering him with that endless night; the one he didn't like._

_Another shadow blinded him, a bright shadow, standing out from the night like sunspots on the sun **(2)**. It too enveloped him and returned him… to where he didn't know but he wasn't drowning… he was sleeping in a white, sterile, room with a man, a different man, and two boys sitting next to his bed with worry plastered over their faces._

_He was in front of a house… a big house. He was safe here. He didn't know how he knew that but he knew that._

_A gun. A laugh. A smile. And darkness._

_He was caught in an embrace, an amaranthine embrace soothing all of his fears… his well-founded nightmares: his memories. A hand smoothed its way through his hair leaving a trail of love and comfort in its wake._

_He was in a cave. Excitement fluttered through him like the bats in the cave's caverns._

_He watched them; their movements fluid and free as they gracefully tumbled around the mat, pausing every so often to spar, but most of all enjoying just being able to 'play' with each other._

_Then it was him, running over rooftops, a free bird flying in the night, smiling like there was no tomorrow._

_Then the shadow was back. It was happening again. The gun was raised he stood in front of it… he couldn't remember why… he just felt the fear, the determination, the sadness that flowed through him. The protective instinct and the gunshot._

_The world was spinning again but this time the all-encompassing night didn't come, the world just went white. There was no pain… just a warm fuzzy feeling that he couldn't place. He could feel people around him in the white. The people that made him feel safe and comforted. That was when he knew everything was going to be okay. That was when he knew it was time to wake up. But he couldn't remember how. Panic was clawing at his throat and gnawing at his heart when he heard the voice._

"_Hi… um… Tim. I know you probably can't hear me… Um… excuse me can he hear me if I talk to him. Oh… Well you probably can hear me so… er… I just wanted to say that… um… I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I used Snowy as target practice… I really am, and at first I didn't understand how you could get so attached to something… but now… I mean my upbringing wasn't like yours… I wasn't taught to… Love… at all. I was taught at arm's length that everything was meaningless apart from my bloodline… and now I realise that was wrong…so I um… decided that when you were… sleeping I would fix Snowy for you… and he looks just like when I found him. Alfred helped me so he is not going to fall apart anytime soon. And I… I brought him along so that he's here when you wake up because you taught me that there is more to family than bloodlines… and that I have decided that you are not allowed to die yet because… I love you and am proud to call you my** brother**."_

_Damian. Something lit up in that white space he found himself in. He remembered. He remembered **everything**; Damian, Dick, Bruce, Jason, Alfred, his mum, dad… the Joker. He needed to wake up… to leave the place in the back of his mind where he had taken solitude, and Damian had just reminded him how._

* * *

"…to call you my **brother**." He placed the toy dog neatly beside Tim's head and sat down in the chair beside him. He swore he saw his eyes move, but when he looked back they were as still as ever he stared at them intently… as though he had missed something and almost jumped out of his skin when Tim's eyes fluttered open with a smile.

"Heh" he tested out his voice, it was horse and incredibly quiet, but it was there and audible "I think that's the first time you've ever called me Tim" Damian blushed he suddenly found his voice as quiet as his brother's

"Actually it was the second; but you were in cardiac arrest during the first time so I will forgive you for not remembering" Tim let out a chuckle at his brother's comment which swiftly turned to coughing. Once his coughs had subsided Tim looked down at the cuddly toy positioned next to his face on the hospital pillow. He tried to move to reach it, but found that he couldn't do so without moving his abdominal area… causing sharp pains to shoot through his body. Seeing his struggling Damian reached for the toy and gave it to Tim instead. Tim looked at it for a moment… inspecting it. When he was finished he broke out into another smile;

"Thank-you Dami, it is perfect." He hugged it close to his right underarm and squeezed Damian's hand with his left. He pulled Damian closer and somehow managed to reach around him to hug his waist with his left hand. "Thank-you for saving my life"

"How would you know who saved-" Damian started but stopped at the glint of higher knowledge in his brother's eyes.

"Who else?" Damian melted and returned Tim's embrace around Tim's head.

"HEAD HUG!" the excited squeal came from the door as Dick, Jason, Bruce and Alfred returned to the room. "Timmy's awake!" Dick squealed again as he ran towards his two youngest brothers.

"Yes Dick we can see that" Bruce smiled as Jason rolled his eyes "Now why don't you give him some space to breathe… he has just been shot after all." At that both boys stopped their assault on Tim's head and pulled up chairs… smiling from cheek to cheek as they did so.

"Tim!"

"Hi Dick" it scared dick just how weak Tim's voice was, but he was determined not to let Tim see that fear.

"You're famous… all over the evening local and international news you were… scare us half to death every time we turned it on… but I guess when one of Bruce Wayne's kids are shot by an evil psychopath it's kind of a news worthy thing isn't it."

"Dick if this is your way of trying to cheer me up… stop now before the hole your digging gets even deeper." Dick smiled sheepishly at that comment

"You got it little bro" he motioned zipping up his mouth and throwing away the key. Bruce shook his head a little and rolled his eyes at his eldest and sat himself down on the opposite side of Tim holding his hand. Caressing it by stroking the back of his hand with his thumb Bruce smiled weakly at his son;

"We're just glad you're alive Tim." And a silent, happy tear rolled down his face.

* * *

_His hand was not going to heal anytime soon. He had just been so angry that he momentarily forgot what he was doing… the next thing he knew his hand was through the new computer monitor and bleeding like no tomorrow. The news had told him everything he needed to know… The Wayne brat had come out unscathed and the drake boy was being rushed into surgery to save his life. Why couldn't a carefully formulated plan ever go to plan? Uncontrollable psychopathic variables. And idiot children who would do anything to save each other… why hadn't he seen that? Because his child is not an idiot… unlike those Wayne kids. Anger boiled in his heart, if you wanted something done right you had to do it yourself. Time to take the fight straight to the source: Bruce Wayne._

* * *

**Hey guys; thanks for reading and I apologise about my bad mood... please review... pretty, pretty please.**

**Yes I do realise I put "kill him dead" at one point… it's Dick's inner thoughts, he doesn't have to use good English ;)**

**(1) I was so close to putting Sainsbury's bag here… and then realised they lived in America and therefore wouldn't have a Sainsbury's… and therefore most of you guys wouldn't know what Sainsbury's is (it's a supermarket chain in the UK), just in case you are wondering they have bright orange bags for you to put your shopping in… this is what I am imagining Damian is carrying.**

**(2) For those of you who science isn't your best subject in the world I thought this might need some explaining… I love astrophysics and so it won't surprise my friends that I came out with a reference like this… Sunspots are 'cool' regions on the sun's surface cause by the magnetic fields lines between two points on the sun getting wound up so much that it stops convection, cooling sown that part of the sun's surface by about 1000-1500 K, causing them to emit less light (photons) so appear darker, even if, when you take them away from the sun, they would appear as bright as anything… this is what the 'Batman shadow' is… just in reverse. To Tim the 'Batman shadow' denotes warmth, love and hope, whereas the 'Joker shadow' denotes pain and death… so against pain and death even Batman as a shadow looks blindingly bright… and I have just realised I think about things too much… sorry but without college I have to get across my love of astrophysics somehow… right? Oh oh fun fact of the day… THE SUN IS ACTUALLY PINK… get your heads around that :) (Apart from Celticlily and Superminion who already know this as I probably remind them once every half term :/ … sorry guys)**

**Oh I will give virtual biscuits to anyone who points out the syntactic parallelism… Celticlilly I will give you real biscuits if you do… just because I am in a biscuits making mood :)... or at least I was.**


	9. 43: Operation Smile

**Hi, back again... YAY :)**

**You guys asked for more Tim recovery fluff so I give you some more Tim recovery fluff:**

**Umm this may sound like I'm being mean... and I don't mean it like that but I would just like to ask people to (okay please please review but) be nice with their reviews. I mean I can take constructive criticism as well as the next girl but calling me an 'illiterate moron' is plain mean and saying that (I'm quoting this because I HATE swearing) my story is 'shit and unworthy of existing' without giving a reason is also quite mean in my books and had me in tears, because I try really really hard with all my writing and (I don't play this card very often, and try not to play it ever really) but I am dyslexic and an extremely slow processor so stuff doesn't come as easily to me as people may think.  
**

**Sorry about that... it wasn't from this fic but it really upset me so I'm going to be putting that note on updates/new stories for a while for that reason.**

**Aaaaaand thank-you EVERYONE who reads this and reviews in a polite way... I promise to be less grumpy the next time I update which will hopefully be in the next few days, but I'm not too sure as I have Olympic tickets (wooo Canoe Slalom!) but I will try to get you the next chapter very very soon.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Batman... if I did then Young Justice would have aired on UK TV much much much sooner than Saturday afternoon... seeing as it didn't I do not own Batman... **

* * *

Tim had been 'cooped up' in his hospital bed for three weeks and was seriously down about it. He couldn't do anything there… except eat sleep and stare aimlessly at the ceiling. They had finally taken him off the heart monitors, once they were sure he wouldn't go into another cardiac arrest. That was a nice bonus to getting rid of the most annoying isochronous beeping ever invented. The first few days hadn't been so bad; his brothers had been there to keep him company, but then they re-opened Gotham High and he was alone. The silence that dawned upon his room was infuriating; he barely made it through the first day. Thankfully Bruce noticed this and put together a 'boredom bag' for him. Tim had never before been so thankful. He then spent most of his day on one of his many electrical devises… his iPad, DS and kindle were definitely the ones needing charging the most.

By the second week Mr Gobnen had finally realised that although Tim was stuck in Hospital for the time being he could still do work. He gave it to Dick to give to Tim at the end of each day; Dick was sure he had never seen the boy's eyes light up so brightly

"Trust Tim to actually want to go to school" Jason had commented, receiving a small elbow to the stomach from Dick, and a glare from Tim. That bright smile soon faded away, Mr Gobnen didn't truly understand Tim and what he was capable of… sure he had been told he was nothing short of a child genius, but he didn't understand what that meant… double digit by double digit multiplication was not it. An annoyed groan escaped his lips.

"What's up Timmy? Too difficult" Dick said the last part as though in astonishment

"Too easy" and with that reply Tim got out a pen and quickly filled in the sheet. He didn't use a calculator or any of the working spaces he just wrote down numbers. Dick, Jason and Damian stared open mouthed and amused. As Dick took the worksheet back he smiled at Tim and asked;

"Do you want me to ask Gobnen to give you something a little more challenging?"

"Yes please" Tim's eyes were bright again… his eyes' transformation was something Dick could watch all day… it made him feel all warm and fuzzy inside and gave him an even bigger urge to smile than he usually had.

Tim's brothers came around every day after school, it made the hospital bearable. At first they only stayed until Bruce finished work, which wasn't very long after school ended… then either Bruce started working longer, or saw that Tim liked having his brothers around and **decided** they needed the time together so stayed at work longer… or forgot to pick them up on time. Whatever it was Tim loved him for it, but that didn't stop him from him being exasperated with having to be in the hospital.

Today was a school day; it was twenty to five and nobody had graced his hospital room, or even been bothered to send him a text telling him why they weren't there or how long they'd be. It was okay to be upset about that… right? He was about to give up for the night and submit to his pain medication that was making him drowsy when Jason and Damian ran, panting, out of breath and with rosy red cheeks into his hospital room

"S…sorry… we're… late bro… Bane got out… we… dealt with…him… but dad's gonna… be a while… he's going back to… Arkham to… make sure Bane... actually gets there… before escaping again" Jason had obviously run from somewhere… but nothing would make him this out of breath unless…

"Hard fight?" he said almost bitterly as he was stuck in the hospital and not able to help. Jason stared at him incredulously, his brow creasing inwards towards his nose in a 'come off it, this is Bane we're talking about... Of course it was a hard fight' sort of way. It was a really funny contortion of his facial features and Tim burst out laughing.

"What?"

"Your face" Tim managed between bouts of laughter.

"What about Jason's face?" Damian's new tendency to use their first names, although really nice (and coming from Damian extremely cute), still took them by surprise and shocked Tim out of his laughter.

"Oh nothing really Damian... It's just Jason's face looks so funny when he makes incredulous 'come off it, this is Bane we're talking about... Of course it was a hard fight' expressions."

"It wouldn't have been such a hard fight if our father had allowed me to participate" Damian's words were full of bitter spite. Jason and Tim shared a look; they had both been through this. The want to go out and help... yet not being allowed, was more torture than every Supervillain could dish out combined. They, however, saw where Bruce was coming from when he made these decisions... mostly, Damian could not. He was only six after all, but no amount of training could prepare a six year old body for a fight with Bane, even Tim had to sit out some fights because he wasn't old enough; he didn't have enough experience or his body couldn't take it… and he was three years older than Damian. Damian just couldn't let it go, and pointed it out every time he had the chance, usually leaving someone to try to divert the conversation away from that particular note; today was not a usual day.

"And how do you figure that?" Jason was angry and tired, you just don't cross him when he's angry and tired, he usually snaps at you.

"Well, Todd-" he was back to using surnames, Tim sighed, that meant he was angry too "I obviously have a lot more training than either you or Grayson and so would have been much more effective in that fight than the both of you" and when one of them was angry it usually ended with shouting; shouting about Bat matters wasn't the most sensible thing to do and could get you grounded for a long time. Jason opened his mouth to speak, or shout, back but Tim coughed loudly and obviously fraudulently. Both pairs of eyes met his and he gave them a 'shut up now or dad will ground you into the next millennia' glare which made them both shrink back in embarrassment. An awkward silence suffocated the room; no one knew exactly how to rectify the situation they had put themselves in, it wasn't until a familiar voice sounded at the door that the tension in the room diffused into the playful atmosphere there had been when Jason had fist ran into the room.

"Aww, you guys started without me" Dick made a pretend sob "… that just hurts" his face broke into a smile which cause a domino effect on the room until each boy was smiling brightly. Tim was still to work out hoe Dick had that effect on people.

"Of course we did" Jason pouted at Dick as he continued "it's cause nobody likes you…" Jason broke into another cheeky but playful smile. Dick was halfway through rolling his eyes at his younger brother when a small voice sounded in-between them

"I like Dick" the room was silent again and the two elder boys looked at each other with their eyes wide and biting their lower lips. Jason caved first and burst into laughter. Dick rolled his eyes, shook his head and sighed deeply.

"What? What did I say?" Damian asked as Jason started laughing so hard that he was red in the face and had tears streaming down his face. Between laughs and wiping away those cascading tears Jason managed to get some words through his vocal chords

"Don't worry little D you'll understand when you're older… and school has poisoned your mind more." Dick's eyebrows shot up at his brother and a smug smile graced his lips

"Or Jason has"

"Yeah… hey that's not fair…" his brothers just stared at him eyebrows raised and looking like Alfred when he says something that's obviously wrong "… okay so maybe it is…" The room broke into more laughter and Dick, Jason and Damian checked off 'Make Tim smile' from their to do list.

* * *

**Thanks for reading PLEASE review :)**

**and YAY Young Justice is finally on British TV... WOOOOOOOOOO! (as you can probably tell I am very whelmed about this) **

**Supernova95 :D**


	10. 44: Supervillain Awareness Day

**I'm back ;) **

**Firstly than-you all so much for your kind words of encouragement... they meant a lot to me and have me in a very good mood (well that and the 6 Golds GB won in the Olympics today :D) I really love you guys and girls so much :)**

**Now onward and upward... well technically downward... moving on... Chapter 10... Yay double figures... :)**

**Okay I keep getting the feeling that I have written 5843 words and nothing really happens, I also feel that the end is quite rushed but I couldn't think of another way of doing it without encroaching on chapter 11, so please forgive me :) and review... nicely :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Batman or any Batman related characters... YET, but I will after I succeed in my plans for Total World Domination BWHAHAHAH *cough* *cough* er I mean after Celticlily, Superminion and I lull you into loving us and giving us your very souls to rule over with ultimate power and authority with cute fluffy bunnies and endangered dolphin charities and stuff... yep. Either that or I could just have you all sware loyalty to me by bribing you with my amazing Momonga shortbread :O**

**Also I am going to try to update before Saturday but if not I will not be updating until the 17th/18th of August as I am at SOUL SURVIVOR WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!**

* * *

"Timmy, Timmy… you'll never guess what…" Dick burst into his room excitedly half-shouting

"I got a hundred per cent in my science test?" Dick stopped for a moment his face falling as he considered what his brother had said

"…Yes" he looked a little confused as to why that was the first thing Tim would have said but then again it was Tim. He looked at his brother "… but that's not what I'm talking about" his voice brightened and he had a full on smile again, if it was possible he sounded even more chirpy.

"What are you talking about?" Jason appeared at the door;

"Yeah" with Damian not too far behind him.

"Timmy's supposed to be guessing" Dick whined

"Dude, you need to stop whining or everyone will think you're related to that crazy version of Supes from another universe" Jason teased

"I do not sound like Superboy Prime"

"I never said you did… I just said you whined a lot…"

"I do not whine a lot…"

"'I do not whine a lot'" Jason mocked in a very good impression of his brother, so good that the two younger siblings started laughing… surreptitiously of course… but still laughing. It took a couple of minutes to subside. They were all in Tim's room now. Jason was leaning against the wall a huge evil smile on his face as Damian and Dick sat with Tim on his bed.

"Well Jason, I never knew you were so handy with impressions…" Damian's face lit up with an idea and evilly cute smile "Who else can you do?"

"I can do a pretty good Luthor…"

"Oh go on Jase, this I've got to see" Dick smiled pleadingly at his younger sibling who just rolled his eyes; he knew he was going to have to do an impression from the moment he mentioned it. He coughed slightly before starting his impression;

"I am the greatest single mind on this planet… no one can beat me, not even you Superman" At first the room was stunned, if they had been blindfolded they could have sworn Luthor was in the room with them. Then, as the shock of the calibre of the impression wore off, they burst into applause.

"Jay, who else can you do?… Alfred?" Tim asked

"Sorry Tim I haven't quite got the English accent down yet"

"How about dad?"

"Not even trying Dick, what if he walked pass the door like right this second…" Jason shuddered at the thought of what Bruce would do if he heard him doing an impression of him, "never risking it."

The others sniggered at his obvious discomfort

"Jason's… scared?" Damian asked astonished yet silently amused

"I am not scared"

"Yes you are Jay…"

"Shut up Dick"

"Chicken… bwa bw bw bw" Dick was flapping his arms around and making what were supposedly chicken noises, although that could be debated.

"What's Jason scared of" the voice came from the door and made all four sons of the bat shrink back with sheepish, and mildly scared, grins

"Umm, maths…" Jason shot Dick the worst scowl he could manage, Dick sent an 'what else should I have said' shrug back "…Jason's scared of maths, we were just um giving Tim his next worksheet… and making him guess the good news…"

Bruce Wayne lifted an eyebrow… not quite sure what his sons were really talking about, he had only heard half the conversation after all… then again he could guess; Jason's Lex Luthor impression had been loud enough.

"Right…" he elongated the word for his desired effect "I'm just going to go and make sure **Lex Luthor** doesn't break into the Batcave and leave you to your **maths**…" as he smiled and walked off he knew they would now be sharing concerned looks about just how much of their conversation he had actually heard.

"Lucky guess…."

"Well Jase you were pretty loud with your Luthor impression, he could have, actually he would have heard it… and he is Batman after all." They had stayed pretty quiet for a couple of minutes; to make sure he was really gone, and not just hiding out of sight. That was one of his favourite pastimes, especially when it was included in a sentence with 'from the commissioner' and 'after, or before talking about another escaped Arkham inmate'. Once they were totally and utterly 100% sure he was gone they shot Jason a 'you were being too loud with your impressions' look… his face was funny. Jason melted at Tim's reply;

"Yeah Tim I probably was" no one could disagree with Tim unless they wanted to be beaten down with sound logic and science and when applicable a lot of faith… it was one of Tim's more annoying qualities, but one that made his cuteness factory increase exponentially; and Tim always seemed to revel in the power it gave him. "Now back to business, one more guess at what Dick is so dying to share; then you tell him Dick" Jason thought it was a workable compromise and everybody else agreed (for one of the first times **ever**)… it still made Tim think though, it probably wasn't about school work, or anything like that, he was allowed out of bed and doing stuff, his stiches were out and he was healing, he wasn't in any trouble (as far as he knew), probably not about Red Robin either… he knew that he was still non active until Bruce deemed him fit and ready for duty… but he was doing light training;

"Mr Gobnen decided to retire" he replied hopefully. He knew it wasn't true… Mr Gobnen looked barely thirty… but that could be some very good make-up and stuff… his elder brothers laughed

"You really don't like him Timmy, do you?"

"No he's evil and makes me do really really boring things in lessons and never gives me any extension work when he's supposed to and shouts at people when they've done nothing wrong and…" he trailed off when he saw the disbelieving faces his brothers wore "What?"

"Are you really complaining about **not** receiving more work?" Damian piped up; he had been going to school for just under two months and he already hated the thought of homework… and his was just colouring in things.

"Um… yes" he smiled sheepishly at them

"I will never understand you" coming from Damian that meant a lot. He was usually very frank with what he said; when he said something, he meant it. He was smart… but hated work of any sort… apparently beating people up was just more satisfying than learning. Really Damian could be brilliant; he just had his mind on other things.

"So Dick, Timmy held up his end of the bargain… what are you so excited about?" Jason returned them back on subject… finally.

"Well you guys won't find it exciting but Timmy will" there was silence, it was annoying

"Aaaaaaaaaand…" Jason egged on bringing Dick out of staring into space

"Oh… um well, Tim can go back to school on Monday"

"Really?" Tim was trying to hide his excitement but failing dismally

"Yeah… the hospital called about ten minutes ago and said you were fit enough after your last check up so you can go in on Monday…"

"YES" Tim exclaimed making a fist and punching the air in elation

"… Just in time for 'Supervillain Awareness Day'"

"…"

"WHAT?" the three younger brothers exclaimed simultaneously after a moment of looking incredulously at Dick

"Yup" Dick said smiling "Babs told me; her dad and the department are planning a special day to focus on what to do and what not to do if another Supervillain graces our fine school"

"You're joking…" Jason said immediately

"Nope"

"Oh well that's going to be a fun day" a bout of giggles broke out

"Sarcasm is unbecoming of you Master Jason" Alfred had brought up four hot chocolates and a plate of steaming freshly made triple chocolate chip cookies. Mouths opened and drooled at the sight of the butler and his goodies. He smiled down at them… sometimes they were the easiest kids to look after, give them some cookies and hot chocolates and they will be angels… sometimes. "I do hope they aren't being too bothersome Master Tim" it wasn't a question… more of a reminder to the others that Tim had been shot and still needs to rest. The nod their heads profusely making Alfred smile. "Good, now once you have had your drinks and devoured what you wish of the cookies Master Bruce would like to see you three" he nodded to Dick Jason and Damian "Down in the cave, Tim needs his rest" he added the last bit in a stern voice looking directly at Tim, knowing he would want to help in the cave for the night's patrol; but he was under strict orders for him to go to bed and go to sleep.

"But I can help" he was obviously going to protest Alfred knew this… but orders were orders and it was better for Tim to be resting.

"I'm afraid not Master Tim, Master Bruce had specifically said that you need to go to bed… apparently you have been overexerting yourself in our subterranean gym." He braced himself mentally for what was coming next: Tim's irresistible puppy dog eyes. "No is no, Master Tim… and I will be checking up on you to make sure you are going to sleep." He heard a soft groan as he lay down the hot chocolates and cookies he ruffled the boy's hair "I'm sure you'll be back out there in no time" Tim smiled a weak smile back at the butler as he left and the room slowly filled with the sound of eating and drinking… his Brother's wishing him a goodnight… and then the tired blackness that was sleep.

Usually they don't know when Tim's awake in the morning; today they did. He was practically buzzing… that and he had whooped loudly when he woke up. Dick walked into the dining room to find everyone up before him, even Jason.

"I'm guessing Tim woke **everyone **up" they all nodded except Tim; who blushed a deep red… even his ears turned a shade darker

"I said I was sorry" Dick smiled at his mumble over his cereal and instantly felt bad about complaining

"Don't worry little bro… I don't mind you being excited about school… I'm worried that you're excited about **school**… but I don't mind… much" he smiled, Tim smiled back.

"Sitting at home is just so boring, I mean there are only a certain amount of times you can read 'An expert's Guide to Space Science and Rocket Engineering' before you know it of by heart."

"I'm guessing that means you're helping to design the next fleet of Javalins…"

"Yup, they're gonna be awesome. They're gonna be bigger and faster, and have better food storage systems for long deep space missions and we just finished designing the new hyperdrive so we can space jump easier and…" As Tim continued Dick was nudged by Jason

"Did you **have** to ask?" he whispered menacingly "he is going to be going on about that for the rest of the day now"

"Sorry, I felt bad"

"You always feel bad" Dick stuck his tongue out at this in a defiant 'I am not' fashion. Jason chuckled his reply.

Breakfast was finished to the sound of the new javelin's specifications and modifications; they really should have known better since Tim was bouncing around the day before after being told he could go back to school on Monday.

"C'mon boys time to go"

"But dad we still have like fifteen minutes"

"Not if we want to get a parking space Dick"

"Why would we want a parking space?"

"You'll see" This was going to torture Dick who, though not naturally the sort of person to want to go out of his way to find things out (like Tim), really hated someone proposing something that was unfinished… he **really **hated it. It was part of what had made him a great Robin, and now makes him a great Nightwing. He smiled down at his adopted son and slowly walked to the door with the whine "But dad… why?" ringing in his ears.

The school car park was like Piccadilly Circus; Dick saw the Gordon's car already there, plus a couple of squad cars and unmarked cars he knew to belong to Plainclothesmen. Then it dawned on him

"You're here for Supervillain Awareness Day, aren't you?" Bruce smiled at his eldest

"Yes..."

"No; you're kidding... Right?"

"No I'm not, the Mayor asked me to come in to talk about Batman Incorporated... And Batman in general."

"Aww man this is not going to go well"

"Dick, it's not going to be that bad-"

"Yes it is; Babs and I will never hear the end of this" Dick started, then decided to pile the guilt onto his adoptive father "the teasing will be merciless" Bruce rolled his eyes, to be honest he had thought that Dick was talking about people figuring out that he **was** Batman, but he smiled and lightly chuckled at his eldest and his fears of being teased mercilessly, it wasn't like here was here to purposely humiliate him... But then again it must be pretty humiliating to have your parent show up and give a short but sweet talk to your entire school; he wouldn't know. However, he did know that it would be best to change the subject as quickly as possible;

"but I am also here to keep an eye on Tim, it is his first day back after all" he smiled meaningfully at Tim, he had the tendency to over exert himself... A lot. Tim rolled his eyes mumbling something along the lines of "I'm fine" The car snorted with laughter, that was a total Bat thing to say.

The group waved their goodbye at the school gates; apparently it wasn't 'cool' to hang around your parents when with friends. So he set off in the direction of the main hall where he met Jim Gordon and what seemed to be most of the Gotham City Police Department.

"Are you preparing for a school assembly or a mass breakout from Arkham?" Jim turned around at his voice; he had been talking to some uniforms,

"Bruce, I'm… so glad you could make it. How's Tim?" The Commissioner's voice betrayed the lie, although he didn't mind Batman, or Batman Inc. the rest of the GCPD weren't so convinced… they hated having someone around who, in many people's opinions, 'did their job's better'. Unfortunately for Bruce, Batman was a ghost in the night so; when he announced Batman Inc. those officers who hated what was going on finally had an actual man to crucify; and gave Bruce Wayne the cold shoulder as much as they could… today was no different. Hushed whisperers broke out, they knew he was here by invite of the Mayor… but just because they knew that didn't mean they had to like it.

"On the mend, actually he's back in school today" The Police Commissioner's face fell

"Oh, we were hoping he would still be at home recovering… I didn't want to embarrass him today… Don't get me wrong" his hands raised in a 'no offence' manner "what he did was brave, and saved his brother's life… but it was utterly stupid and we don't want a repeat; ever."

"Yes he has already suffered this talk from me, I'm sure it won't hurt… if it does I'll get him some Ice Cream on the way home"

"Ah the age where ice cream solves everything…" Gordon smiled and looked like he was reminiscing somewhere in the back of his mind

"Yes, I'm just glad Dick and Jason haven't grown up yet, I don't know what I'm going to do when ice cream or cookies don't solve everything." this receive a hearty laugh from the police commissioner,

"I don't think you're going to have to worry about that, those boys will never grow up."

"I'm counting on it" they clasped hands as a final greeting, before they got down to business

"**I'm** actually really glad you're here Bruce," he had lowered his voice and taken them off to the side of the room where no prying ears would hear them "I feel like the mayor has thrown me to the wolves. Arkham crazies and gang wars I can deal with but teenagers... I find it hard enough with my own daughter."

"No problem, just doing my bit, and I'm sure it won't be that bad…" famous last words.

Gotham High, due to its elitist tendencies wasn't a large school. In fact, with the tables removed, the whole school could fit in the canteen... given it was a large canteen. Unfortunately that was what Jim Gordon feared, a lot. It wasn't what he feared the most; if he got sprayed with the Scarecrow's fear gas he would not suddenly find himself in a room surrounded by over excited hyperactive kids and annoyed pubescent teenagers, no, he **had **lived in Gotham his whole life and seen too much for that; but at this moment it rated pretty highly on his list.

Expectant faced looked up at him. Most of the room's eyes were focused solely on him and it made him nervous, but he couldn't help but smile at the kids in the front few rows who were in awe at the room they now found themselves in. He knew it was school policy that first and second graders usually didn't venture into the main school building unless they had elder siblings who would take care of them due to their size and 'vulnerability'; at least the school was trying to stamp out bullying, even though most bullying happened within classes and years, not usually between them, but then again other schools didn't even try.

As he surveyed the room it struck him just how odd it was that he could pick out the people he knew and loved so easily… when he said 'people' he meant Barbara. She was almost in the exact centre of the room sitting next to Richard Grayson-Wayne, and she was blushing presumably from having her father standing at the front of the room about to take an assembly. They were having a conversation although they were very good at hiding it, and it was apparent that his presence in the room was not the only thing making his daughter blush… perhaps he has to have a little fatherly talk with Mr Grayson-Wayne.

He was cut off from his protective instincts by the Principal clearing his throat.

"Settle down everyone" there were still some boys at the back chatting loudly and not paying any attention to him "Settle down" he tried again and still nothing. His eyes narrowed "Sam, John, Roger detention lunchtime tomorrow; my office, do you want to make it an afterschool?" they shook their heads "good so settle down and shut up." They were obviously seniors or else the principal wouldn't have spoken so bluntly towards them, still a small smile came to his lips that the principal at **this** school even remotely thought of saying the words "shut up" to his pupils, let alone actually saying them. He blinked and subtly shook his head for a few moments anchoring him back in the room, the boys were silent and every eye in the room was looking at Principal Ashtkins for what was actually going on.

"Thank-you, now everyone I would like to introduce Police Commissioner Gordon" whispers passed through the couple of rows in the middle of the hall and Barbara turned bright red. The principal waited a few seconds for the loudest whispers to subside before starting again, his voices telling the others it was time to be quiet "who is here by request of the Mayor to address what to do if another Arkham escapee finds their way into the school" the principal gestured for him to move forward and begin. The hall burst into an uneasy and uncertain polite applause. Barbara had told him that they did this for every guest that came into the school so although it made him jump at the spontaneity of it he did not let it visibly phase him in front of so many kids. He coughed

"Um, thank-you. As you know the Mayor asked some representatives" eyes darted to the police officers and detectives behind him "of the Gotham City Police Department to come and talk to you this morning about the incident with the Joker." There was a collective intake of breath as he said the name, and a couple of the younger ones shrank back in fear, the shooting still etched in their minds. He glanced around and surprisingly found Timothy Drake-Wayne staring at nothing but the wall directly in front of him, his face like a brick wall; emotionless and unforgiving. This in itself gave him pause, he had met the kid at a few galas and charity events and he seemed like such a bubbly care free child, this change was painful, and it hurt him that he was about to hurt the kid even more "as much as commend the actions taken by Timothy Drake-Wayne for saving his little brother" all eyes turned to the poor child who noticed immediately and scrunched himself up into a ball, he glanced towards Bruce Wayne who mouthed "Ice cream" who nodded for him to carry on and try to make this moment as short and painless as possible; "we also condemn them. Whatever happens, if another person comes into the school threatening you, whether he, or she, is a costume crazy, as the press put it, or just a random thug meaning to do harm, we do not want you to approach them, and whenever possible run in the **opposite** direction. If you do become cornered in a classroom, do not make yourselves stand out and comply with their demands as much as possible whilst waiting for the police. Thanks to Wayne Enterprises the school has been fitted with new security systems, each serving a different purpose; such as CCTV cameras being added to every possible access point to the grounds and many corridors these are being monitored 24 hours of the day, just in case someone suspicious does try to get into the school; also each of your classrooms have been fitted with a silent 'panic button' so that if those CCTV cameras do miss someone your teachers can notify the department as soon as possible. If one of these buttons is pressed the Department will make sure that they respond as quickly as possible to ensure your safety, so only your teachers will know where they are so they are not misused." He had darkened his voice to make sure that people got the message. "Your teachers will also have access to certain things like a button to lockdown the doors in case of an attack; and gadgets that will hopefully save lives in an emergency" he was being deliberately obscure, he knew exactly what security measures the school was getting, he had been at the planning meeting, he just didn't want to say anything just in case the school had been infiltrated **again**, someone definitely has it in for these kids… then again this could just be another normal day at Gotham High, they don't ever seem to be deprived of fireworks here. He looked around the room again; they all looked positively petrified. It was a necessary evil. He was using the scare them into doing what he wants approach… it works well enough for Batman, although he really should reassure them; "I'm not saying this to make you afraid, but for you to understand that we are doing **everything** we can to make sure you are safe" He motioned to Detective Bullock to join him. "Now that the formal bit is over we have put together a few presentations about what the Police Department do, and what the newly formed Batman Incorporated do." This received some excited whispers; things about Batman always do in Gotham. "This is Detective Harvey Bullock, he is going to tell you a bit about what he does every day." From the moment Bullock said "Hi kids" he wondered if he should have gotten Montoya to do the talk.

On the whole it wasn't as painful as he had been expecting, Montoya had to step in a couple of times; that was a good thing, the last thing he wanted to do was for Bullock to go off on some tangent and go into too much detail about a case and scare the kids silly… Gotham at heart was a dark and gory place, even the simplest hold up seemed to go south and end in bloodshed. Many people had said there was no hope in Gotham, many had given up trying to change the place and had simple learned to live with it, many had turned to crime themselves as though it was a legitimate profession. Not only did this make their jobs harder as a police force but it also gave rise to the numerous organised crime families Gotham hosted and, contrary to popular belief, it attracted the costumed Supervillains everyone knew. It was true; Batman came after the first costumed crazies. The GCPD had been tracking numerous villains before Batman showed up, with no success but also no press. He caught them and dropped them off at the nearest precinct, attracting the papers, making names for the idiots who decided to dress up and start hurting people; in truth that was what they were most annoyed at Batman for. Yes he was doing good in Gotham and weirdly enough the city felt safer and brighter with him around, even though he worked from the shadows, but did he have to make the people he caught so public.

He breathed a sigh of relief as Bullock finished his talk without mentioning anything remotely scary… I had actually been quite a mundane simple presentation… Montoya had obviously helped… but it was over and now people were allowed to ask him questions. A boy near the front's hand shot up

"Have you ever met Batman?" his voice was eager, like they all were about Gotham's Dark Knight

"Yeah kid I have" Harvey didn't care to elaborate; he didn't like Batman all that much. He didn't hate him but they weren't likely to be found on the same pub quiz team.

"What's he like?" the kid was persistent, Gordon gave him that

"Well he is bat like…" not really knowing what more to say Harvey paused "… and also ninja like, he does this disappearing act every time the Commish turns on that dar- um… stupid night light of his" the room broke out into hushed whispers about the bat signal, the caped crusader and strangely enough his young partners. Another hand shot up, this time further to the back of the room

"Have you ever met a Supervillain?" the room descended into complete silence and everyone looked as though they were collectively holding their breath

"Yes…" a gasp, as though they thought the police never dealt with the Supervillains, as though they thought that that was Batman's job alone

"What did you do?" a girl in the middle of the room asked in awe but before the detective had a chance to answer one of the noisy boys from earlier at the back chimed in

"Well obviously he made a Bat shadow and watched laughing as the freak wet himself and ran away screaming back to Arkham where he belongs" Gordon was shocked at the words coming out of the boy's mouth, malicious and full of contempt, he thought it best to move on but didn't quite know how to respond to that, fortunately Principal Ashtkins did

"Rodger you just made it an afterschool, see me afterwards… please continue Commissioner Gordon."

"Thank-you Principal Ashtkins, um I think we have heard all we need to about the daily life of a police detective… thank-you Detective Bullock" a ripple of applause floated round the room "Now they Mayor has asked that Mr Wayne here come and tell you a bit about what Wayne Enterprises are doing with its new branch… Batman Incorporated" As Bruce Wayne stepped forward he was me with the most enthusiastic applause so far… kids these days were so hooked on superheroes it was actually unnerving. The only ones who weren't applauding eagerly were Wayne's kids and he supposed, like Barbara, they had an excuse.

"Hey everyone, Commissioner Gordon has completely destroyed the first part of my presentation, the part where I introduce myself, so I guess I'll just have to get on with the fun stuff." He was as flamboyant as ever, to many it was truly laughable that a person like that could be the head of such a successful corporation like Wayne Enterprises, or have the brain functions to lead such an initiative like Batman Inc; but he knew that it was just for show, that Wayne actually had two brain cells to rub together, he also smiled at the irony of his presentation. "The fun stuff being taking you though some of the gizmos and gadgets that the Batman Inc department of Wayne Enterprises has been working on. Up first we have this…" he held up a piece of cloth, part of a cape… or costume; "…this is a titanium Kevlar composite with infused D30, it is basically indestructible, lightweight and movable, it bends and flexes with the wearer but can stop bullets at point blank range… it has been so successful and durable that the army's new uniforms are going to have a layer of it in them for extra protection." The man at the front of the room smiled "Timmy, can you come and help me with this next thing" and Gordon smiled too, he knew Tim was exceedingly bright… helping his dad show off a gadget would be better than a lifetime's supply of ice cream. The boy got up and walked down to the front of the room and smiled at the gadget they were showing off. It was a remote controlled car, Tim picked up the controller and started to drive it around the floor of the hall; "This is a prototype of the 'Batmobile' you may see flying around Gotham. Yes it really does fly" that was a response to the faces of disbelief that passed across the room like a wave "the schematics for the engine are on the board were designed by Wayne Enterprises scientists… but this part," he picked the remote control car up and flipped it 180 degrees opened the latch at the bottom and showed the glowing blue insides to the school "which is called the hover inducers, were designed entirely by Tim here" he blushed as the school let a few gasps and confused whispers leave their lips; his father put down the car on the floor again "Take it away Tim." The boy flipped a switch and the car was airborne.

"Well, that could have been worse" Dick said leaving the hall just before lunch so they could get the tables set up again.

"True" Barbara replied. They stopped to the side of the corridor and waited for the others to come out.

"Ugh" he stretched out "I'm so glad we have an early lunch, and only one lesson later… I don't think I could deal with my normal Monday, I'm too tired and not in the mood."

"I know exactly what you mean" Barbara smiled at him, he smiled back

"Hey Barbara…"

"Yes Dick"

"I was wondering"

"Yes…"

"If you would like to come to my hose tomorrow night so we can study for that end of unit test in maths?"

"Yeah Dick I'd like that a lot; I just have to check it's okay with my dad"

"Of course, text me when you know" he smiled, she smiled back

"Urgh get a room" were the next words they heard as Jason rudely interrupted their moment. Tim and Damian followed shortly afterwards

"Lucius just phoned, something's gone wrong in one of the tech labs so he has to go back into work, and will probably be there until late, so Alfred is going to be picking us up at normal time and go back for dad later"

"Okay Tim" Dick responded, for some reason he felt like today was going to be a long day.

"Alfred, we'll be fine. You're going to be away for forty-five minutes, an hour max, we'll behave ourselves." Dick was trying to get them out of going to Wayne Enterprises to pick up their dad, by using the I am responsible argument and promising to keep Jason in line and chandelier swinging to a minimum, preferably none at all. The butler relented; strolled to the car and drove off to find Bruce and bring him home. The group closed the door behind him and grinned wildly… what could they do I forty-five minutes.

They didn't start to worry until forty-five minutes became an hour and a half, and still no answer from either their dad, Alfred or Betty at the front desk of his office, so he had obviously left… but should be back by now.

When they had been gone for three hours Dick picked up the phone and called the only person he thought could help- Commissioner Gordon.

"Hey Barbara, id it possible to speak to your dad?" he was passes over.

"Dick?"

"Hey Commish…"

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know if I'm over reacting now or what but Alfred picked up dad over three hours ago, and they still haven't returned, and it's only a forty –five minute journey."

"Don't worry Dick I'll send out a patrol squad over immediately, and apparently we are coming too" … that was obviously Barbara's powers of persuasion and apparently being police commissioner has its perks.

They started thinking that the squad cars had been either very close or very fast because no more than five minutes later they heard a knock on the door, which in itself was weird as people usually rang the doorbell.

Dick opened it expecting to see police officers but was instead confronted by a beaten and bloody Alfred who was struggling to stay standing, he was swaying… it looked as though he had a broken arm he might have a few broken ribs, he had a black eye and probable concussion. Before they could get him into the house he fell, Dick and Jason tried to catch him as best they could, to prevent him doing any further damage to himself. He looked up at them, about to slip into unconsciousness and managed to whisper

"They've taken Master Bruce" before succumbing to exhaustion. Dick wasted no time in running to the phone.

* * *

**He he... BIG announcement... you WILL find out who Evil Minion Guy is next chapter :)... I know I know you're all dying to know who he is now... but patience is a vertue you know ;)**

**I can also promise lots of lovely Nightwing/Red Hood/Red Robin/Robin butt kicking action :)... oh and also Dick cries... because we all love it when Dick cries... :)**

**Eeeek, thank-you for reading, please review... **

**Supernova95 :D**


	11. 45: The Potentate

**Sorry that I took so long to update... writer's block and bugs (of the sick kind) aren't good mixes...** **I hope you enjoy XD**

**...SORRY IF IT'S A LITTLE ANTI-CLIMATIC :( I tried my best :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Batman**

* * *

"Alfred?" the man called to his driver when he stepped into the car.

"Yes Master Bruce" came the usual reply

"Do we have any ice cream at home?"

"Not to my knowledge sir, am I to presume that we will be stopping on the way back to the Manor?" The man smiled back

"You presume correct" his answer was almost mocking the older driver in such a playful way it was practically family teasing. The elder man shook his head and rolled his eyes

"Very well Master Bruce, should I also presume the flavours or are you going to tell me."

"Actually Alfred I think I want to do the shopping this time…" The old butler smiled at that

"I'm sure the young Masters will be pleased at that as you always seem to let them have the most indulgent chocolaty things you can find" his voice was disapproving yet gentle and it made the younger man smile whilst chuckling slightly.

"What can I say I'm a sucker for cute little puppy dog eyes"

"Very well Master Bruce" and the car pulled off.

They were perfectly poised to do their Master's bidding. The tracer; the inside man; the perfect ambush point. By the time anyone noticed the wrecked car; the broken butler or the missing CEO it would be too late. Their master would have his revenge on those who ruined him.

* * *

Something's wrong. Why didn't he feel it before? He was Batman for goodness sake.

"Alfred?"

"Yes Master Bruce?"

"Something's wron-" he was cut off by the sound of the car's tyres bursting and simultaneously hitting a pot hole; sending the car flipping. He wasn't sure how many time it rolled over, but he did know the car ended up upside down and his head hurt. Never before had he been so happy for the invention of seat-belts. He was about to call to Alfred, to make sure that he was okay when, no sooner had he opened his mouth, something was forced over it... a cloth, rag, covered in... Chloroform...

* * *

Alfred's eyes blinked open. His body groaned in pain... it hadn't been this bad since his time in the war*.

"Master Bruce?" he could no longer see the man in the back of the car "**Master Bruce?!**" his voice was hoarse, it was difficult to move. He had to find Master Bruce, his friend, his employer… his son.

Alfred was viciously ripped from the car; dragged out by numerous sets of hands. He felt himself being held up, he was too hurt to do anything but hang there, his shoulders feeling like they would soon be ripped out of their sockets as his hips were hoisted off the ground but ankles still dragged along the road.

"No" they stopped moving abruptly jarring his shoulders and hips, making him wince in pain "The Master does not want him." Alfred heard the familiar ruffle of clothes as the others around him looked at each other

"Then what shall we do with him sir? Dispose of him?"

"No leave him here, make it look as though he climbed out of the car"

"Do you want us to shoot him?"

"Are you an idiot?!" the man's tone was harsh, annoyed and aloof "in fact don't answer that. If the police were to come and find a body of an old man with a bullet in his head are they going to think this was a simple car crash? No they are going to think it was murder, and then they are going to open an investigation drawing unwanted attention to the Master. Just leave him there, he is old and frail; he will not last much longer anyway. I doubt anyone will recognise him if they found him, and if they do it will be too late and our Master will have his revenge." There was a malicious sense of pride in his voice; that, if he had been able to, would have made Alfred cringe and want to punch him, as his 'Master' did not sound like a very nice man. He was shoved roughly downwards, the men positioning his legs into the car, kicking his face into the dirt and placing his arms as though he was crawling. They didn't stick around, he was glad for that at least, because it was only a few miles back to the manor and he had to tell the young Masters… they needed to get help.

The journey home was more painful than he originally though it would be. His chest and head hurt, but he was determined to get home, they had to save Master Bruce before goodness knows what happens. He sighs in relief when the manor comes into view, only a couple hundred more passes and then everything will be alright, because the boys will know what to do; not many people give them much credit, but they are surprisingly bright (well everyone knew this about Tim, but the others are too), and have **a lot** of common sense. It comes from being trained by the Batman and himself. British common sense… finest in the world**, although whatever vestiges of it he left on Master Bruce seemed to leave him on more than one occasion because he keeps getting himself hurt, but at least he hasn't gotten himself kidnapped in a long while.

Alfred manages to make it to the door, only just though, and weakly knocks, not being strong enough to raise his arm high enough to ring the doorbell. He just hopes someone will hear him. The door opens and he collapses, muttering his news under his breath, knowing it will be loud enough for the attentive Robins to hear.

* * *

The squad cars arrived a few minutes afterwards, with an ambulance in tow. A few minutes have never taken so long. Dick kept his finger on Alfred's wrist throughout the wait… just to make sure. He wasn't going to die… Alfred was too stubborn to just die on them, but they had to make sure… and then they had to find their father. They had left the door open simply because they didn't want to move Alfred. Tim had found a couple of blankets to throw over him to keep him warm and Dick kept checking his pulse, but really all the four boys could do was wait and hope.

"Commissioner Gordon!" Dick shouted as he saw the familiar man step out of his unmarked car with his daughter following closely in tow. The man stopped for a brief second and then rushed over to them. Assessing the situation in moments he stated barking orders immediately.

"Barbara, honey, do you think you could go and tell the paramedics to bring a gurney with them? It'll save them the hassle of going back" she nodded; a little white in the face, and ran swiftly away. "Dick; what happened?"

"I don't know… Alfred arrived back a few minutes ago and collapsed on us…" he looked up at the Commissioner a pained expression on his face "he said that someone has taken dad." The three younger boys standing behind Dick held each other closer together when this had been repeated, each suddenly feeling the nausea of knowing that someone they loved had been kidnapped, and not knowing if they were alright. The same nausea that they knew Bruce felt every time one of them was hurt, or kidnapped or put in the slightest bit of danger. But Bruce felt it at least fifty times worse. That nausea, however, stopped suddenly when the commissioner next spoke, being replaced with a strange sinking feeling;

"We can handle things here. If there's somewhere you boys need to be… something you need to be doing I understand.**(1)**" Their eyes flew wide. Looking at each other with disbelief Dick managed to stammer out;

"N-no Commish, we d-don't have anywhere we need to be… except here… with Al" he could feel his slack jaw as he desperately tried to pull it up off the floor and close his mouth.

"It's okay boys, we'll do things our way and you do things your way… your father needs you, don't expect me to keep you from him. Alfred will be fine, now go" he was practically shooing them off. It was weird, Dick wondered how long he had known, and surmised that it was probably before him… of not he definitely knew when he arrived on the scene; how could he not? He didn't become Police Commissioner for nothing.

The four boys practically super-sped up the stairs and out of sight, but they didn't miss the proud smirk on the Commissioner's face before they did.

"Dad? Where did the boys go?" Barbara asked as she returned with the paramedics, who immediately started tending to Alfred.

"I sent them inside with some uniforms, there's nothing more that they can do. If there is a ransom demand the kidnapper will ring here, and expect to talk to one of them, not the police, I told them to get some rest, if they can, we'll take care of Alfred and we will keep looking for their father until we find him."

"Oh…" he looks away from him then back up at him with a bright expression "Can I stay with them too?" he rolls his eyes at her in exasperation, but smiled down at her kindly

"Not tonight Barb, it's a school night… and I don't really think they need someone invading their family at a time like this. Do they?" she looked down blushing, telling him that she understood. "I've asked Harvey to take you home on his way back to the department, he's heading up the investigation there; I'm staying here in case there is a phone call demanding ransom." It wouldn't come, he knew that. If the kidnapper wanted a ransom he would have gone for one of the kids, as it was Wayne couldn't get any money for them when he was at their mercy in an undisclosed location. No this kidnapping wasn't for money; it was undoubtedly for revenge, probably something to do with Wayne Enterprises he doubted it was about the **other** aspect of Wayne's life; if it was they again would have gone for one of the kids… whatever it was: it was personal.

They were the worst kind of kidnappings, every minute that passed without a lead, or clue, or **anything** decreased the probability of Wayne's survival; that's if he's even still alive. He hugged his daughter fiercely before guiding her to Bullock's car and kissing her lightly on the forehead telling her goodnight and not to wait up because he has a job to do. A man has been kidnapped, and they have four young boys disparate not to lose another father. **He **can'tsee that happen to them **again**. It was gut wrenchingly painful the first three times.

* * *

It was weird being in the cave… working on a case… without Bruce; Batman. It was even weirder hacking into their father's personal files to see who he's annoyed recently to give them a clue as to who has him.

"You found anything Babybird?" Tim glared at his brother, he had long given up on telling him that he was no longer the 'baby' of the family... but then again nobody would EVER call Damian a baby for fear of some sort of horrific retaliation they all knew he was capable of.

"Not yet Jay... Dad's got plenty of enemies... but none of them have the capability, mindset or means to kidnap him." His brother's brow the fear felt by those left behind. This was different. Bad different… really bad different. Whenever one of them had been creased. They all knew what it was like to be kidnapped; well all but Damian, they knew about the fear the kidnappee felt; but when they were kidnapped before it was always for ransom, making it easy to find the person responsible and bring them down; getting them home safely. But this time, there had been no ransom demands, nor would there be. Who would kidnap a multi-billionaire and then demand ransom from his sons? It didn't make any sense so they were under no false pretences… they had to find their father or lose him forever to an evil megalomaniac with a grudge… whom they didn't even know yet.

"Hey Dickybird" Jason stopped talking and even Tim could hear Dick getting angry over the comm, and he had placed his on the computer console… talking annoyed him when he was trying to work. Jason's face fell; Dick was most likely lecturing him on whether it was appropriate to make jokes at a time like this. Dick was definitely the most stressed out of all of them. It was probably because he had been kidnapped the most… not all of them because they wanted money off of Bruce Wayne.

"I know Wing, I'm sorry" only Dick could get Jason to apologize. "Hey Babybird, put your comm back in, Wing has some info for you" he was back to smiling… his coping method. Tim nodded, picking up the small metal device and inserting it into his ear, pressing the button on the side and opening the channel.

"Hey Dick what have you got?"

"Multiple kidnappers; not very good at hiding their tracks… at least ten from what we can tell. There seems to be some foreign samples on the ground, we're bringing them back to the cave to analyse…" he paused and it wasn't a good 'I'm just checking something else' pause it was an 'I have something bad to say and I don't know how to break it to you pause'

"Dick… what is it?"

"There's a lot of blood Red, lots of it… especially in the back of the car, we're bringing back samples, but it looks like it's mostly his" dad's, Bruce's… Batman's. He felt his face whiten and so did Jason's when he glanced over to him. What was there to say? There wasn't really anything to say… comfort? Kind words of encouragement? Nothing really held value at the fact that their father could very well be dead.

"Gotcha Wing; see you when you back to the cave" it was cold not to say something; but they couldn't let themselves panic… Batman's life hung in the balance and the worst thing they could do was panic; he taught them that himself.

"Okay Red be about ten minutes" and the comm went silent, off, not even the faint buzz of static on the open line. Tim felt his face fall into his hands at the hopelessness of their situation. He heard Jason fall into one of the chairs at the console next to him. It took them a few minutes but they were soon up to working again; simply fuelled by the utter need to find the person who meant the most to them in the world.

* * *

The analysis took less than five minutes; it was Gotham mud. Bruce has an extensive database of Gotham mud samples, and thankfully, the mud in different parts of Gotham was unique.

"The docks… upper east side… across the bay from Gotham Lighthouse… looks like there's only one building in the area… a warehouse… 72, right on the sea front." Tim read off the information the computer gave him.

"Not very smart are they… only one building; oh I wonder which one it is"

"Seriously Jay, stop joking… I can't deal with it at the moment."

"Sorry Dick. So; anyone know how to drive the Batmobile?"

"No But I can fly the plane"

"Really… Tim how do you know how to do that?"

"Dad taught me as my last birthday present… stop looking at me like that, just because I'm a quick study… and dedicated… okay obsessed… so are you coming?" the three other boys needed no more encouragement and swiftly ran to the plane Tim was prepping. They **were** going to get their father back, and whoever took him **was** going to pay.

* * *

His head hurt. Side effect of the chloroform and a gash on his head, which he could feel dried blood down one side of his face. Every instinct he had was telling him to panic. He opened his eyes and saw black: a blindfold. Great. Gagged, hands tied, legs tied... his waist is even tied to the chair behind. Thorough. He managed to move; well distortedly wriggle and moan a bit into the gag. Hopefully whoever abducted him was nearby and would hear him.

"Ah; glad to have you back with us 'Brucie'" 'Brucie'? Great this was definitely a personal revenge thing.. The **man's **voice echoed throughout the –_warehouse?- _they were in. He was a new crazy; his voice pattern was unquestionably different from any of the usual rogues. He knew **their** voice patterns like the back of his hand… even when disguised by voice distorter. They were not alone; he heard the unmistakeable sound of impatient shuffling feet… probably the minions who had abducted him in the first place. Time to play the idiot playboy.

"Who- who are you? Please, I'll give you anything you want… just please don't hurt me…" he should be given an Oscar every time he puts on this mask.

"You already are Brucie, you already are. You see; all I really want is you. I want you to be an example to the rest of your kind."

"M-my kind?"

"Yes Brucie… your kind. The rich. The famous. The undeserving people who light up our front pages day after day with their nightly… exploits. The people who think they're untouchable by the rest of society because they have the money to; bribe, pay-off and squander their way through life."

That was when he felt them. His sons, his robins, his soldiers. He wanted to smirk at how his kidnapper and just lost; and add a little breathy snort at how much he was going to hurt tomorrow when he woke up in Gotham General. But he didn't; and it took all of his willpower not to, because giving anything away might endanger his sons; and he wasn't willing to risk them for the world.

Even the dank light from the warehouse burned his eyes, making him blink, as the blindfold was removed. As his eyes adjusted he looked around fiercely for the man keeping him hostage, studying his surroundings as he went. He was correct; a warehouse, right next to the water front he could hear the waves crashing against the walled sea front and he could see the Gotham Lighthouse's light flashing periodically through one of the windows. He was in the centre of the average sized warehouse with a single, blinding light pointing down on him: interview style. The edge of the circle of light surrounding him was lined with the minions who had abducted him earlier. They were big… he hoped Alfred was okay… war vet. or no war vet. Alfred was getting on in his years and would be vulnerable to these men… especially after a car crash.

* * *

The warehouse was on pretty good shape; given the part of Gotham it was situated in. They had gotten there as fast as they could… they even took the Batplane as it was the fastest mode of transport and just hoped and prayed that it would be fast enough.

A silent scale to the roof, an open hatch and a crawl through the old ventilation system later and they were in. They could have broken through the windows, or crashed through the door, but, if by some stroke of luck their dad was still alive, they didn't want to risk making the kidnapper panic and kill him in a fit of frightened thoughtlessness.

A man was circling their father; who was tied thoroughly down to a chair… and still breathing. The mad was in a full length black cloak with the hood pulled up putting his face in shadow; however his voice sounded awfully familiar.

"Hello Brucie" a collective cringe… they **hated** 'Brucie' simply because it just wasn't dad. In fact it was probably the furthest from dad you get. "We are the People's Protection Party… and I am The Potentate" he removed his cloak and it fell softly to the floor, revealing his face and identity.

Dick let out a small strangled cry… not loud enough for the group of people on the warehouse floor to hear; but plenty loud enough for them.

"Mr… Mr Green… how?... what?..." Dick was right; John Green AKA The Potentate AKA Tony's father had kidnapped their dad as some sort of… _political statement?_ He might not be the brightest puppy in the litter but even **he** knew that was just **wrong**.

Green was wearing a toga crossed with a mission impossible esq outfit… it was actually laughable yet very Ancient Greek crossed with black military. He looked the part of a party Dictator.

"Potentate… Master, your son is here" one of the minions came running in, surprisingly loud and clumsy; bowing to The Potentate before gracefully waving to the door.

"Ah the true Prince arrives. I would introduce you to my son, but, I believe, you have already met."

"Hello Mr Wayne..." Tony stalked into the room looking very smug; regal even and Dick made a sound like a kicked puppy.

"Tony… Why would you do this?" Bruce was saying in a very similar manner to Dick's whine.

He shrugged, "Why not? And getting to punch the circus rat turned playboy's play boy was… deeply satisfying"

Tim, Damian and he had to physically restrain Dick at that… even through the mask Dick's anger radiated off him. Tony just made this personal. He doubted he'll be coming back to school anytime soon.

"_**DON'T YOU DARE TALK ABOUT MY SONS LIKE THAT"**_

Jason smiled at that… if there was one thing you didn't do when around Bruce Wayne it was insult his sons.

Green Sr laughed, "We'll talk about your 'sons' however we want… they are nothing compared to mine… and the world will see that once we are through with you…" Bruce relaxed into the 'I know you're there' and 'anytime now would be good' posture and they got ready.

"Well Brucie, I'm sure you're wondering what we're going to do to you. It's pretty simple really. We're going to torture you to the brink of death… and then string you up from your beloved Wayne tower as a message to those who become too rich too and too powerful for their own good, that Gotham is not your personal playground. We are not your subjects. Your sons aren't Princes who should be cherished more than everyone else, who should be treated differently, who should get to do whatever they want because they carry your name, who get to go to the best school in Gotham County because their beloved father pays for everything, even when one has made it his mission to burn the place down he's still there because 'Daddy' paid for a new; state-of-the-art science lab. No, we are going to torture you… and we are going to make you hurt… and then we are going to take over your precious city; because the rich should work for the poor."

* * *

Laughter rang out around the warehouse. It was… _Jason's?_ that was different; usually it was Dick's

"No… no… I'm sorry, that's just too funny…" The Greens' heads flew around trying to pinpoint the echoing voice "…you want to make a political statement by abducting Gotham's favourite citizen, torturing him, then stinging him up for the whole city to see… and then expect them to love you and follow you and do your every bidding… because you got rid of the one man trying to save this God forsaken place… that's really just too funny"

John Green- The Potentate- was red with anger "_**Where are you?!**_"Jason was right behind him, unbeknown to Green, and that made Bruce smile; he had taught his boys well.

"Here" Green visibly jumped at Jason's low growl and turned around only to be punched squarely in the jaw. Then all hell broke loose.

It was amazing watching his sons work. They were graceful yet deadly, beautiful and precise. They worked with an economical elegance that made him mentally not never to get on his sons' bad sides… if they worked together they could take him down now… in the future all four will surpass him and he just hoped that he had raised them well enough for them to use that to help people and not hurt them… because they could take over that world if they wanted… heck Tim could probably do that now. The fact that they didn't hurt people… but did their all to save them, made him burn with pride; because they were his and he was never going to abandon them. He was never going to see them get hurt, because every time they did; something inside of him frayed, propagated that little bit more… and if something did happen he thought it might snap, break entirely; and God help whoever made that happen because he's not sure there would be anything left of them once he was though.

Every movement they made was planned; in their heads they have already won this fight. Robin and Red Robin took down the minio- party followers, they fell easily… knocked out cold; putting up little resistance. It was nice to see Tim and Damian getting along so well… they had never let their animosity for each other affect their field work but since Tim's shooting and Damian's… revelation, their movements just seemed to fit, they clicked in a powerful statement of brains and skill that at times looked more like a graceful dance than a fight. Taking out the little fish left Dick and Jason to the sharks… something they revelled in.

Jason was fighting Green in a flurry of aggressive punches and kicks. Whilst making quips and jokes… a quirk that Dick rubbed off on him.

"So tell me… Red Hood… how did you find us?"

"It was simple really… mud."

"Mud?"

"Yeah you really should get your minions to clean themselves off more. The mud they left at the car crash pinpointed your hideout precisely… Batman keeps a **huge **database of mud samples from around Gotham… you'll never know when you'll need them" Green was getting angry… that's exactly what Jason wanted. The Potentate was becoming sloppy, his movements forced, his transition of weight unbalancing; "…also next time try hiding in a place where the warehouse you're in isn't the only one for miles around… it takes longer to check them then." Green tried to land a very hard punch to Jason's sternum, which he simply flipped over, and pushed his attacker over landing a kick to the side of his face. Green went down; and stayed down, moaning slightly.

His attention shifted to Dick, who was fighting Tony… his usual graceful moves of an acrobat forgotten in his rage… Bruce didn't blame him; he just hoped he wouldn't slip up and make a mistake. Then again Dick making a mistake was highly unlikely. He was Dick.

"So Batman sent his Robin Brigade… where's the big man Nightwing?"

Silence was unbecoming of him. Dick was the blindingly bright child that you just couldn't shut up, no matter what happened. Seeing him fight in a silent rage actually scared Bruce. Dick reminded him so much of himself; and if there was one thing he wanted for his children it was for them not to become him.

Even in his rage Dick was efficient… even more so than usual, taking Tony down with an ease he has never seen from the boy… in a way it made him proud just how well he had taught them. The fight was over as soon as it started and the room was filled with a sea of unconscious bodies, four Robins and a billionaire. Sirens wailed outside signalling his sons' departure, untying him as they went, before the room was stormed by some very relieved looking police.

* * *

"Mr Wayne, you should be fine for discharge in the morning… but we want to keep you under observation tonight… just in case"

"Thank-you nurse" he smiled his sweet playboy smile, causing the nurse to blush and promptly leave the room.

"Is he here?"

"Is he okay?"

"What about Alfred?" the voices were muffled until the commissioner opened the door to his private room in the hospital.

"Alfred is fine… he is resting next door, and not to be disturbed…" there was a sincerity in his voice that caused the boys to shrink back in embarrassment.

"Yes commissioner" rang out in unison

"Okay in you go…"

"DAD!" and he was being smothered by his four children, even Damian joined in the group hug.

"Thought we were going to lose you" Dick and Jason hugged him tighter at Tim's words, he just laughed.

"You can't get rid of me that easily" …queue getting smothered again.

"We know"

"Just"

"Never"

"Scare"

"Us"

"Again"

He laughed some more… "Note taken… Damian?" the boy looked up, he had shrunk away after the initial hug "there's room for one more… and I'm not taking no for an answer" he never thought Damian would be the shy one… but in the face of physical contact that wasn't part of a fight he had never been taught to enjoy things like hugging. So he resorted to pulling Damian into the group; sharing a smile with the older boys when he relaxed into the hug.

* * *

"Is he okay?"

"I don't know dad… he's just really upset about Tony" Dick could feel Bruce's small smile from through the door and across the room. He just couldn't bring himself to get up and go out to them. In the end he didn't need to. Bruce opened the door and slipped into his room as silently as he could, coming to settle beside him, not wanting an explanation: just sitting.

"I'm sorry" he offered trying to hold back tears… he sounded broken and hoarse… crying did that to your throat.

"Sorry for what?" came the reply… he thought it should be obvious. He got suspended from school; he **never** got suspended from school, that was Jason's job, but no he had gone and gotten suspended from school.

"For getting suspended" he waited for the curt nod, or the deadly silence that never came.

"You think I'm going to be mad at you for getting suspended over punching Tony because he has pretended to be your friend for the last five years and then called you a circus rat and implied that I was abusing you in a very inappropriate manner?" Dick had to laugh… he just couldn't stop himself; he had never thought it would be put quite like that…

"Ummm, yes?"

"Well think again because" he was tickling him… the almighty Batman was tickling him "if I did then I would be the world's worst dad and biggest hypocrite… the amount of times I got into fights at school… Alfred has some pretty god stories"

"Really?"

"Yep, now, are you either going to cheer up and come down for dinner? Or are you going to continue to sulk here in your room like a brooding Bat?" He does not brood

"I don't brood"

"Oh really? Because it looked like brooding to me, and I should know; I'm the king of brooding…" He didn't know quite how he did it but Bruce always had a way of cheering him up…

"Okay, okay, I'll come down… can you stop tickling me now"

"Nope…"

"DAD!" Making his eldest son collapse in a fit of laughter was a good end to the day.

* * *

**(1) I will be returning to this later... ;P**

***I'm totally going Falklands War with this one… :)**

****Take this however you want… thought I'd have Alfred being a little patriotic here… although I could name a few Brits without common sense *cough* the government *cough* especially Michel Gove *cough*. Sorry Mr Gove if you are reading this, but I am a British sixth form student who is extremely angry at you for raising uni fees… extremely angry… gggggrrrrrrrrr NOBODY CAN AFFORD £9000 A YEAR!... (which turns into about £13500 a year because of maintenance and food and stuff)… And Celticlily and Superminion will agree with me here… as well as EVERY OTHER STUDENT IN THE COUNTRY! Also… WHOSE IDEA WAS IT TO CHANGE THE GCSE SYLLABUS _HALF WAY THROUGH THE YEAR?! _Because that was idiotic stupid and unfair too… and shouldn't be allowed to stand in any part of the UK… and it is unfair if one country changes its marks and not the others… so Mr Gove as Education Minister… SORT IT OUT instead of sitting on your hands everyday…**

**… By the way I have met Mr Gove (he came into one of my Maths classes) and told him my feelings… but he didn't really seem to care. :/**

**Thanks for reading... sorry about my little rant about Politics... :****/**

**Supernova95 XD**


	12. 51: Canopic Jars

**Hello :D**

**Sorry about the ****_extremely _****long time it has taken me to update... Fear not I have not forgotten this story I have just been suffering from writer's block with it and have had a lot of college pressures to deal with **(yay UCAS is over I have had all my interviews and all my uni choices are giving me offers and coursework is almost over too) **so I should be updating more regularly now :)**

**This chapter is for Celticlily as she was feeling down and said I had been writing too much sad stuff *cough hurting Tim too much cough* and so I wrote pure Tim and Jason FLUFF! You had better be happy now C!**

**So ENJOY :D**

* * *

"Jason we're going to be late" he was running up the stairs as he shouted, determined to drag his elder brother out of his room even if it killed him.

"Timmy we have a whole hour before we have to be at the museum."

"Yeah and it takes half an hour to get there from here and it's a Friday morning and so traffic in the city centre is going to be really bad, and it's always better to be early than late, you know; better safe than sorry and yeah..." Jason smiled as the smaller boy opened the door "you ready?"

"Yeah kiddo, where's Alfr-"

"Alfred's waiting outside in the car" a smaller hand wrapped around his own and practically dragged him out of his room down the stairs and out of the front door, stopping briefly to pick up their ready packed bags, before racing down the front steps.

"Woah there Babybird, a little excited?" Tim nodded vigorously

"The museum has a limited time Egyptian exhibition at the moment, and well Ancient Egypt is really interesting" Jason chuckled, he ruffled his younger and still recovering brothers hair...

"Whatever you say Babybird, whatever you say" Tim grinned up at him from seat inside the car.

* * *

Tim was right traffic was really bad, they got to the museum a mere five minutes before they were due to be registered. Tim looked very smug with himself,

"Told you so Jay"

"Shut it brat" he laughed and ruffled Tim's hair just to make sure that he knew that Jason was kidding; not that Tim needed it as he proceeded to stick his tongue out and challenge Jason to a race up the museum steps.

"Oh you're so on Babybird"... And he lost. Tim beat him. The scrawny, really really tiny kid beat him. How was that even possible? "You totally cheated" Tim frowned

"Jay, how exactly could I do that?... I beat you fair and square; you're just having some trouble adjusting to that line of thought" how exactly could Tim be so snarky and so matter of fact at the same time?

"Uh huh? I'm just supposed to accept that a little scrawny kid like you could beat me in a fair race?" He grabbed Tim into a playful headlock ruffling his hair until he began laughing "I don't think so Babybird"

"Jay... Jay stop heh.. please..." There was a distinct clearing of a throat behind them,

"If you two are quite finished..." Jason let Tim go muttering an apology but sharing a mischievous grin with him once their teacher looked away "Thank-you, now everyone squeeze in... I can't talk that loudly... In front of me please... if I can't see you then you can't see me..." Once everything was in place and silent she began. "Good morning everyone, I hope you're all excited for our day out today" it was so patronising Jason thought he was going to hurl "we're going to split you up into mixed aged groups for your tours around the museum and the we'll all be back together this afternoon for a couple of activity workshops."

Jason smiled a little. Normally they were split up into their year groups and taken around like that... but their dad had 'asked' (more like ordered) the school to put Tim and him together because, even though Tim wouldn't admit it, he was still far from recovered and dad was worried, so he was on brotherly lookout duties.

Just like when they were younger and Dick and he used to pretend that the treehouse Bruce had got them in the gardens was their fort and that they had to take turns in keeping watch over it and the princess they pretended it housed?

Yeah, just like that... except Tim wasn't a princess (well that could be debated). He had the naturally pale skin, the long thin fingers, crystal clear blue eyes and was definitely the most frail... vulnerable out of all of them. Even dad was the most protective over him, he'd never admit it, but it was obvious. Yes, Tim was definitely the family princess.

And it certainly surprised Jason; but he really didn't mind being on guard duty. He never really got any quality time with his younger brother these days, not with all four of them and Dick being insistent on his Timmy cuddles. He would take what he was given... and if that meant being dragged around a boring museum, so be it.

"C'mon Jay we're leaving now" Tim waved a hand in front of his face snapping him out of his own little world and he smiled as Tim started walking to where their group had disappeared off to,

"Right behind you Babybird"

* * *

"Jay, Jay, look at these!" He glanced over Tim's shoulder

"What are they?"

"They're called canopic jars. They house the internal organs of the Ancient Egyptian mummified dead, the intestines and stomach and lungs and stuff... but not the heart, they left that inside the body, or the brain, the Ancient Egyptians didn't think that the brain did anything more than cause mucus and colds and so during the mummification process they stuck a hook up the nose of the dead person, swished it around a bit and pulled the brain out and threw it away." Jason made a face... Even compared to the horrors of the Gotham night life that was still one of the grossest things he had ever heard,

"Ugh, great Babybird, just what you want to know on a Friday morning... Wait does that mean the Egyptian afterlife is basically full of a load of brain dead zombies?" Tim made that give me a moment to process and think about what you just said expressions and cocked his head

"Well, technically they're not zombies... But quintessentially yes, the Egyptian afterlife is full of a load of brain dead zombies." Jason laughed and leaned in closer to get a better look at the jars...

"Sooo Babybird?"

"Yes Jay..."

"Who slash what are they?"

"They are representations of gods, the four sons of Horus to be precise." Tim pointed at them each in turn "The human looking one is called Imsety and stores the liver; the baboon... No the other one jay... Yup that one... He's Hapi and contains the lungs. The jackal headed one's called Duamutef and protects the stomach, and sometimes the small intestines also, and last but not least the hawk headed one is called Qebehsenuef and contains the large intestines."

"Qeb...eiiirrssen..."

"Qebehsenuef" Jason raised both his eyebrows and stared at his younger brother half in admiration and half in shock before slowly shaking his head. "What?"

"Babybird, one day that brain of yours is going to explode with the sheer amount of information it contains."

"Jay, you do know that is physically impossible." Tim looked as though he was actually considering the possibility and Jason just rolled his eyes, shaking his head more

"So are you Timmy, so are you." As he walked back to where their group was having cartouches and hieroglyphics explained to them, he could just about make out Tim in his peripheral vision struggling to contemplate what Jason had just said.

Well at least some things still stump the nine year old.

* * *

When they got back home Dick was there waiting by the door, still suspended from his 'attack' on Tony.

"So how was your visit to the museum?"

"Surprisingly interesting" Jason smirked at Dick's surprised expression.

"How about you Timmy?... Timmy? Tim, what happened?" Tim had worn a confused look ever since their little conversation. Over the canopic jars, Jason was beginning to believe had had dome some permanent damage.

"Jason said I was a physical impossibility... Which is impossible as I am here and I don't understand."

Dick sent Jason a short glare before turning his attention back to Tim. "And why did Jason say you were a physical impossibility?"

"He said 'one day that brain of yours is going to explode with the sheer amount of information it contains' which _is_ a physical impossibility."

"Oh Timmy, Jason was complimenting you on how smart you are"

"Really?" Tim looked up at him first but then turned his attention to Jason, the confusion of before replaced with shining blue gems of excitement and hope.

"Yeah, kiddo" Dick just managed to get out of the way before a Tim sized figure pounced on Jason and the two of them fell to the floor.

Dick just stood there and laughed at them.


End file.
